U.S. Students Support Haitian Residents After Earthquake

By: Tanya Roscorla on February 08, 2010

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Left to right: Fifth-graders Abby Stone and Oscar Patterson serve food along with eighth-grader Bo Kiwala at a fundraiser at Cornerstone Learning Community on Jan. 29.

[Photo: Left to right: Fifth-graders Abby Stone and Oscar Patterson serve food along with eighth-grader Bo Kiwala at a fundraiser at Cornerstone Learning Community on Jan. 29. Courtesy of Jason Flom.]

At schools across the country, students are organizing meals, selling wristbands and donating their time and money so that the Haitian people who were impacted by the earthquake that rocked Haiti last month can survive another day.

They saw the images of toppled homes and hungry children and decided to do what they could to help. In Tallahassee, Fla., three grades worked together to sell baked goods, serve a Haitian lunch and collect supplies at Cornerstone Learning Community.

“One of the reasons why we did this fundraiser was because it would help many people who have broken limbs or they have diseases and things like that, and they might die,” said fifth-grader Noah Wise.

The fourth-graders cooked fried plantains for the Haitian lunch, and collected water, cans, diabetes kits and baby formula, said fifth-grader Peter Sass. The fifth-graders in Jason Flom's class ran the bake sale, made a salad for the meal on Jan. 29, organized posters and created a movie to tell the community about the event.

“We were thinking about starting with Haitian pictures," Oscar Patterson said.

"Like happy ones," Wilson Abshire added.

"Happy ones and sad ones," Oscar said.

Wilson continued, "And then we would transition to the sad ones so everyone would feel really sad and stuff and feel like they would have to come.”

They created the clip with iMovie, and then Flom posted it on the class blog and e-mailed it to everyone who went to Cornerstone. The eighth-graders helped spread the word by writing a press release, and they cooked the rice and beans, Peter said.

By the end of the day, the students had collected $1,300 to send to the American Red Cross and Doctors Without Borders, said fifth-grader Ross Donaldson.

To learn more about how students across the United States are supporting Haiti, go to Converge’s Web site.

You may use or reference this story with attribution and a link to
http://www.emergencymgmt.com/disaster/Students-Support-Haitian-Residents-Earthquake.html

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