For the fourth year, more than 200 Ottawa Township High School students became part of the solution to world hunger.

Each year, students in the school’s Freshman Academy have been asked to come up with solutions to the problems of world hunger and limited access to clean drinking water, said teacher Pamela Cronkright.

“Students research local and international organizations and then choose which one they want to help,” she said. They sometimes raise funds for the organization; often they volunteer at a local organization or “create and present a public service announcement”encouraging others to get involved.

Preliminary totals show this year the students raised more than $12,000, volunteered more than 250 hours, and created public service announcements seen by thousands, Cronkright said.

Students can select from a list of organizations, or suggest one, to send the money they have raised.

Triplets Sam, Matt and Emily Poundstone, of Marseilles, with the help of their family, held a pancake breakfast that brought in $565 for the Marseilles Food Pantry.

Officially, it was Sam and Matt’s project. Emily and a friend saved their lunch money to raise $50 more in contributions.

Silver Young, Bethany Crum, Shelby Leonard and Sarah Lyons held a bake sale outside Handy Foods. Rachel Thrush and another student sold candy bars, which raised $150.

Cronkright said one non-auditory special needs student programmed a presentation into a speech machine and went homeroom to homeroom and gave his “talk” while his aide held his poster. He collected $83.

Students decided to send most of their funds to charity: Water, a global nonprofit organization, builds wells to provide drinking water in developing nations, and Heifer International, another global nonprofit, provides livestock, seeds, and trees to those in need.

Locally, in addition to the Marseilles Food Pantry, students volunteered or raised money for the Community Food Basket, Illinois Valley Public Action To Deliver Shelter, and the Ottawa YMCA.

Tom Hart, another Freshman Academy faculty member, also led this year’s World Hunger Awareness Project, but shifted the credit to Cronkright.

“She was the one who came up with this idea,” Hart said. “I’m just following along.”

– Katie Brockman

Source My Web Times
Photo The Wild