Dateline: January 20, 2005

Students raise $2,100 for tsunami victims

By Ashlee Estlack, Clarendon Enterprise

Third grade students at Clarendon Elementary raised more than $2,000 last week during a fundraiser for children who were victims of the South Asia Tsunami.

The fundraiser began Friday, January 7, and ended Friday, January 14, with the students beating their original goal of $600 by Tuesday and raising a total of $2,107.06.

The funds raised will be donated to the U.S. Funds for UNICEF and will be designated for “School-in-a-Box” kits.

“We raised enough money for 11 boxes of school kits,” third grade teacher Tisha Ham said. “That will help 880 kids.”

The majority of the money collected was in change; and students in elementary, junior high and high school as well as people in the community donated.

“The kids dumped out their piggybanks,” Ham said. “We had one large donor who wrote a check for $200, and our largest student donation was $73.”

According to Ham, each student who donated money was given a bookmark along with the satisfaction of knowing they helped.

“I feel very proud because we’re helping a lot of people,” third grader Haley Ferguson said. “I brought my whole piggybank.”

Third graders David Johnston and Audra Thomas said they also felt proud.

“Now they can buy school supplies,” David said.

“I feel proud because we did something we need to do to help children who needed help,” Audra said.

Fourth grader Bryce McCrary said helping made her glad that people were helping the kids.

“I hope they can get a good education,” she said.

The third graders have also been very interested in the tsunami disaster, and the teachers have been incorporating information about it and the fundraiser into their curriculum.

“It’s been integrated into everything we’ve done,” third grade teacher Pamela Prescott said.

“A lot of people helped roll the change so the students could use tally charts and bar graphs in math class to show how much money was raised each day,” Ham said. “We will also use the information we’ve gathered in word problems to get ready for the TAKS test.”

The tsunami, which struck on December 26, 2004, has been called one of the worst natural disasters in modern history with a death toll of more than 160,000 and hundreds of thousands more left homeless.