Monday, February 13, 2012

Ciudad Hermana/Hilton Donation Stage 1: Collecting and Packing Donations

One of the projects that Ciudad Hermana (the Sister City program between Rochester NY and El Sauce, Nicaragua) is working on is sending a large donation of school supplies, used clothing, and supplies for the hospital to benefit the community of El Sauce. They will be sending the donations on a cargo ship bound for Managua, which will be then sent on truck to El Sauce after going through customs. Then, Martha and I will have the pleasure of opening all the boxes, sorting the donations, and distributing them to the schools, children, and people most in need in this area. It should be quite the interesting experience!

As the title of this post suggests, the first stage in this process of course was to get the donations. Ciudad Hermana members and friends collected many supplies to donate for this shipment, but they weren't the only ones to get in on the fun! Back in October, Martha, the employee for Ciudad Hermana that runs all the programs here in El Sauce, visited Rochester to spread the word about the program and see if more people would like to be involved in some way. One of the schools she presented at was Hilton High School, and the students and principal were so impressed by Martha and the program that they wanted to get involved.

One of the ideas they came up with was to run a school supplies drive to donate send on the shipment. From what I understand, the International Baccalaureate (IB) students were in charge of organizing this drive, gathering all of the donations, organizing them, creating a master list of everything, and packing the boxes. It sounds like they put a lot of work and time into this, and we are incredibly grateful for all of the efforts of the students, Mr. Bartalo (this principal), and everyone who donated!

Mr. Bartalo and Tim McMahon shared some pictures of the IB students organizing and packing all of the supplies, and I want to share them with all of you so you feel part of this process! My plan is to take pictures of the whole process...receiving the donation, unpacking everything, and distributing it so you can all see who has benefited from the donations!

 Tons of school supplies!!!

 Hilton HS IB student helping organize the donations



 Mr. Bartalo with the packed boxes

IB Students: Emma Steinmetz, Jessica Marengo, Katie Wroblewski, Mark Romig, and Nadia Wallace

Mr. Bartalo, HS IB students, and Tim McMahon, member of Ciudad Hermana

Tim's car packed with school supplies donations!
Thank you so much to everyone who participated in this! I will keep you posted as the process develops!

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