New ways to SHARE: A look at three of SHARE’s newest projects

Lemonaid for Sierra Leone:

Lemonade stands aren’t just for nine-year-olds looking to make a few bucks in the summer anymore.

This school year, one may drive down Mission Road to find a lemonade stand outside of East hosted by juniors Maddie Collins and Libby Wooldridge, as part of their SHARE project LemonAid for Sierra Leone. New to the SHARE scene, LemonAid aims to collect items and send them to needy areas in Sierra Leone.

SHARE doesn’t permit simple money donations, so the funds collected through the lemonade sales will be used either to buy mosquito nets for the Sierra Leoneans or to pay for the shipping of the donated items.

“I think one of the biggest challenges will be actually getting what we collect to Sierra Leone,” Wooldridge said. “It’s so corrupt that we’ll have a hard time even knowing if it does get there.”

Earlier in the school year, Collins and Wooldridge met with Pat Kaufman and Leslie Multer, the director and associate director of SHARE, to brainstorm different items they could collect through drives at school while taking into account the weight of the shipments.

“Someone brought up something like toothbrushes, but [the Sierra Leoneans] don’t brush their teeth,” Wooldridge said. “You have to work inside the culture and not bring something new.”

Suzy Meier, a family friend of Wooldridge and board member of the LemonAid Fund, exposed Wooldridge and Collins to the idea for their project last spring. The LemonAid Fund supports developmental projects and programs in West Africa. In addition, Meier introduced Wooldridge to the founder of the fund, Nancy Peddle, last summer when they all visited the same lake in Michigan. Wooldridge got a chance to share her plans with Peddle.

“[Peddle] thought everything sounded really great,” Wooldridge said. “She just really emphasized that anything we can come up with will help them. The little things really do make a difference.”

Though Wooldridge and Collins are still working out the details of LemonAid, Wooldridge is thrilled to finally be in charge of a project as a SHARE chair.

“It’s not actual hours and going to volunteer somewhere,” Wooldridge said. “It’ll be kind of fun and different, making a difference for people in Sierra Leone and helping them get what they need.”

To the Rescue:

Six months out of every year, fishermen in the Japanese village of Taiji take part in the dolphin drive hunt. The name may be reminiscent of scavenger or Easter egg hunts, but from September to March, 1,200-1,800 dolphins are slaughtered in Taiji alone. Thousands more are killed in other Japanese waters.

To the Rescue, a new SHARE project headed by seniors Betsy Dee and Dan Stewart, is spreading the word about dolphin slaughter in Japan.

“If people just know about it, there’s people who are willing to give to our environment and help make a difference.” Stewart said.

Stewart and Dee are holding a screening of the film “The Cove” in the choir room at 7 p.m. “The Cove” is a documentary following dolphin trainer Ric O’Barry that exposes the dolphin killing in Taiji, Japan, as well as the unsuspecting Taiji citizens who consume the mercury-filled dolphin meat.

“I’ve seen a bit of “The Cove” and I had no idea that that was going on,” Dee said. “I was really shocked by it.”

Following the film will be a party at the East pool, complete with a diving contest and dolphin-inspired games.

“There’s this game where we butter down the [inflatable] dolphin and put it in the pool,” Stewart said. “Someone has to ride the dolphin for four seconds without falling off.”

Senior Chloe Fischgrund, a SHARE exec, originally came up with the idea for To the Rescue, but was looking for some students to be the chairs for it.

“I wanted to get involved with SHARE somehow and she brought me on along with Dan Stewart,” Dee said.

To the Rescue is unique in that it is one of the few projects that benefits animals. In addition to raising awareness, Dee and Stewart are hoping that people will be inspired to donate money to the organization affiliated with “The Cove.”

“I’m excited mostly because it’s a new project,” Dee said. “Hopefully a lot of people will get into it.”

Kaboodle for Kids:

Last year, juniors Paige Kovarik and Carolyn Wolff began working on their Gold Award for Girl Scouts, the highest award possible. They had to create a service project that both benefited the community and would last long after they graduated.

Thus Kaboodle for Kids was created as both their Gold Award and SHARE project. Kaboodle collects children’s activities such as books, games and puzzles, wraps them in a fleece-knot blanket, and delivers the packages to Children’s Mercy Hospital to be distributed to kids in intensive care.

“Making these blankets and little activity bags brings so much comfort to the kids who are really sick in the hospital and are there for a long period of time,” Wolff said.

Last spring, the girls began the project, holding book drives at Mission Valley Middle School and Corinth Elementary. This year, they’ll do drives at East and a few elementary schools, along with possibly setting up a donation bin in the lobby of Children’s Mercy. Kovarik and Wolff are still working out the details for this year, but have a basic idea of what they and their volunteers will be doing.

“Once a month we’ll get together and make the fleece blankets,” Kovarik said. “It’s a fun thing because we sit around and watch movies and eat brownies.”

The fleece material for the blankets is expensive, with each blanket costing around $10-12. Kovarik and Wolff plan on talking to the SHARE directors to work out ways they can raise money to fund their project and buy blanket materials.

Though the volunteers are assembling the packages, they only drop them off at Children’s Mercy. Privacy and health issues prevent them from coming in contact with any of the long-term care patients receiving the Kaboodle packages, but Wolff knows that their hard work is appreciated.

“I’m excited to get the volunteers involved and show them how passionate we are about this project,” Wolff said.