THE STAR METRO - Monday January 29, 2007

INTERNATIONAL SCHOOL'S PUPILS SET UP STALLS TO HELP POOR KIDS

By DEBBIE CHAN

 

IT was a fundraising event to help children in need. But the seriousness of their cause did not stop the primary pupils of Alice Smith School from having fun all the same. 

The pupils, aged 11 and below, had earlier put on their thinking caps to come up with creative activities and products to be sold at the fundraiser.  

The result of their putting their heads together were stalls that offered not just cookies and desserts, but also manicure services, story-telling, construction play and even a disco where the students got to groove to the music.  

The games stalls were also a hit, offering water balloon and pillow fights and a dunking game where students got to hit their friends with soft balls.  

The school is targeting to raise at least RM20,000 to be channelled to The Lighthouse Children’s Home, The Rainbow Home, Sri Shenbagavalli Ashram House, flood victims in Kota Tinggi and “Project in Vietnam” in partnership with Save the Children UK.  

“The whole effort is to help promote learning among the less fortunate,” said the school’s charity coordinator Sarah Wheeler Tan.  

 “Our aid to the ‘Project in Vietnam’ is to support the organisation’s efforts in northern Vietnam to help fight child poverty while help for the flood victims in Kota Tinggi is in the form of books and stationery for 81 children at the Azam Gemilang Kindergarten there,” she said.  

 “The interesting thing about this effort is that it is organised completely by the students themselves. The teachers and parents only served to help and guide them. All the stalls and activities are manned by the students themselves,” she added. 

To further help the flood victims, 11-year-old student Lateef Zainudin initiated a collection drive for coffee, biscuit, sugar, canned food and towels to be sent to Johor via the Social Welfare Department. 

 “My father’s friend was involved in a similar exercise and I thought it would be a good idea to do this in school. It has been a very interesting effort so far and I really hope that the flood victims will benefit from this,” he added.  

The drive is part of Lateef’s Year 6 Challenge where all Year 6 students of the school have to learn two new skills, spend six hours in a charity effort, undertake a jungle adventure and keep a newspaper journal for a month to complete the challenge.  

“This challenge is to help promote the students to be independent, responsible, and to be in tune with the community around them,” Tan explained.