A group of students gather Friday mornings at 7:15 in room 229. They say their hellos and then start spitting off ideas on how to help their community any way they can. This club is the UNICEF Club. The main focus of the club: Support UNICEF, an organization that helps kids in need.
The UNICEF Club chapter at East was founded by Claire Whittaker early last year with only a handful of other students involved. It has grown into multiple fundraisers that are expanding to include more schools in the area.
UNICEF stands for United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund, which provides different items to children in need all across the world. Those items range from food to medical supplies. In 2013, the organization gave $2.3 billion in supplies to boys and girls all over the world. The East chapter donates to the United States section of UNICEF, which helps out kids in need in the United States.
Last year, the UNICEF Club put on a fundraiser at Prairie Elementary School on Halloween to collect donations for a fundraiser called Trick-or-Treat for UNICEF.
“Our biggest success was Trick-or-Treat for UNICEF.” Club Vice President senior Caroline Birt said. “That fundraiser will be our focus this year as well.”
The single fundraiser raised more than $1,000 from Prairie. Since that successful fundraiser, the club is looking to expand to other schools in the area. With the added schools, members expect to raise more money this year.
“We raised more money than we could have guessed last year.” Birt said. “That is why we plan on expanding the fundraiser to other schools as well.”