Wayzata High
School
"H2O for Life" students from Wayzata High School accept
a donation of $20,000 from Yo Ta, representing the Supreme
Master Ching Hai. The donation will help fund water, sanitation
and hygiene education projects in Africa. Wayzata previously
raised over $5,000 to fund a water project in the Phillipines,
and is continuing to raise funds for a school in Ethiopia.
Will walk for
water To Wayzata High School custodian Komlan Edeh, the idea of walking hours each day to get water was once much more than the travail of distant people. When Edeh heard about a steeled group of Wayzata students who walked three miles each school day this past December to raise money for a water system in the Philippines, he knew the kind of benefit their effort could bring. |
Lakeshore
Weekly News |
|---|---|
| A group from Wayzata High School manages to find fun while walking to the high school to raise money for people to get clean and convenient water. SUBMITTED PHOTO: CHRIS OLMANSON |
In Edeh's youth, his village of Tchekpo-Dedekpoe in Togo didn't have running water and the river where they got water was miles away.
A pump made a world of difference, said Edeh, who came to the U.S. three years ago.
"The water is sometimes very dirty because many people go in to fetch water. So you have to go early in the morning, like four, five o'clock. That way you can find clear water. When we have pump, we don't have to go to the river any more," Edeh said.
The Wayzata Walk for Water was a way for students to raise money for the Twin Cities based H2O for Life, which works to connect U.S. schools with places internationally that need clean water.
The Wayzata High School group's goal was $5,000, which it met on Jan. 25 with the help of a $3,000 check from humanitarian and spiritual leader Ching Hai.
Now the total is around $5,600, said Mary Kay Williams, youth service coordinator in the Wayzata district.
"It was wonderful, the kids were just amazing," Williams said.
The spark for the idea to walk came after an after-school club started a partnership with H2O for Life.
Chris Olmanson and his brother Alex, both juniors, and Jack Angell and other students took it from there.
"We saw that the kids at the school we were raising money for had to walk several miles a day to get water," Chris said.
And according to H20 for Life, every 15 seconds a child dies because of lack of access to clean water.
The walkers were allowed to park their cars at Greenwood Elementary and hike north to the high school starting at the drowsy time of 6:40 a.m.
News of the walk spread by word of mouth and through Facebook and a blog, and later through a newspaper story.
"We just kind of told our friends about it. And they would tell some of their friends and it kind of spread," Chris said.
Between six and 15 students walked per day and they only missed one day because of frigid temperatures, Chris said.
"There were a couple other really cold days so we just wore ski goggles and winter jackets," he said.
They plan to continue the fund-raiser next year.
Orono Middle School also partnered with H20 for Life, raising money for a project in San Lorenzo, Nicaragua, by collecting donations and selling T-shirts.
And as the publicity for H20 for Life picked up, the organization received a boom in participation.
Patty Hall, a teacher at Highview Middle School in New Brighton, started the effort in 2007 to raise money for a water project in Kenya.
"We never intended to do more than one project," Hall said.
Last year, 16 schools in the U.S. participated in H20 for Life.
But after an article in "Reader's Digest" and a spot on the "Today" show, 112 schools have jumped on board.
"The growth this year has been phenomenal," Hall said.
Edeh said it's good to get people involved in reaching out to others around the world.
"My first impression is like, oh, that's so nice," Edeh said.
