This is my 10th year teaching and for 9 of those years, I've worked in junior highs with 12 and 13 year olds. One of the things I know to be true about most people is that they don't look favorably on 12 and 13 year olds. They don't really contribute to society, they can be a little annoying, they don't listen to authority very often, and they are very awkward. I see all of these things on a daily basis, but this week I was blessed to see something a little different.
A few weeks ago I received an email from my principal to come and see him when I had a few minutes. After I calmed down and realized that I hadn't done anything recently to be in trouble for, I headed down to his office. He showed me a letter written by three 8th grade students (2 of which were on my team last year) asking him to consider letting them do a coin drive to raise money for the famine currently taking place in Africa. These girls had seen a story on CNN Student News about the famine and drought occurring in the Horn of Africa. Over 30,000 children have already died from this and that fact did not sit well with them.
My principal asked me if NJHS (the club that I am an advisor for) could help them organize this drive, but with only 3 weeks left in the quarter, it just wasn't going to be possible. I agreed to think over their proposal though.
About 2 weeks ago, I told my principal that while NJHS could not help because of the short notice, if the girls wanted to go ahead with their idea, I would be the faculty member they could work with. The idea made me feel a little stressed with all the other things I had on my plate: giving a test, finalizing grades for the quarter, ordering our team t-shirts, meetings, and somewhere in there sleeping. But I just felt so bad saying no since they were so passionate about it.
The girls emailed me and were so professional. I told them that I would handle the announcements for the drive and inform the staff about their responsibilities but they had to provide the containers to collect the change and handle the collection and counting.
This past Monday the Coin Drive for Famine in Africa began. The girls had gotten containers donated by Sam's Club, cleaned them out, cut holes in the lids, and created awesome labels for each bucket. The parents had decided to award the class that raised the most money with a pizza party so we started announcing the drive with a ton of hype. The girls made posters all on their own and hung them up around campus.
Yesterday, the drive ended. I helped them get all the change organized so they could take it to get counted. As it turned out, at the end of the 4 days our school raised almost $1200. The top 3 classes (2 of which were from MY team) raised almost $600...half of the total amount raised by the school. Combined with the elementary school that the girls organized a coin drive for, today they were able to take $3000 to the Feed the Children event.
After my class was told that we had raised over $170, I had the privilege of talking with my students about the good that they had done. In four days, my class had managed to find change, con their parents into giving money, and sacrificed their own allowances to help change the world. I told them how much money the 2 girls who organized the coin drive had raised. I told them to never doubt that they can change the world, no matter how old they are.
And yesterday, I had a wonderful day being a teacher and challenging my students to, "Never let anyone look down on them because they are young."
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