Volunteers create new classrooms for Astoria school

One lucky Astoria school is benefiting with new class space from a community outreach program by an international company.

As part of its Heads, Hearts and Hands program, workers from information technology services company Dimension Data volunteered to beautify I.S. 126Q on May 21 and convert storage space into new classrooms, allowing the school to serve an additional 120 students.

Employees from the company also painted murals and classrooms, and created a teacher’s lounge in the school, named Albert Shanker School for Visual and Performing Arts at 31-51 21 St.

The Astoria school with 531 students was just one of 11 around the country that was selected by Dimension Data for its outreach initiative, which was partly to promote learning and giving back.

“Our corporate social responsibility program, Heads, Hearts and Hands, spans the breadth of our global business, involving 58 countries in five regions,” said Mark Slaga, CEO of Dimension Data Americas. “Our corporate values define who we are as an organization, and in 2014, more than 25,000 Dimension Data employees got involved in a variety of causes that made a tremendous difference and we are looking to do even better this year.”