WES community gathers together a donation for damaged Houston elementary

Post date: Oct 03, 2017 6:31:4 PM

The Wells Elementary School community recently reached into their wallets, and piggy banks to donate whatever they could to help a Houston elementary school recover from the devastating effects of Hurricane Harvey.

According to teachers who organized the collection, Pam Lear, Marty Cryer and Melissa Stapleton, $2,569 in coins, bills and checks was raised over a five day period ending September 22nd. “This was a whole school effort,” summed up Cryer.

Remarkably, a significant portion of that amount, $1,421, or 55 percent, was raised by a couple of dozen first through fourth grade students who gave freely of their pennies, dimes, nickels and quarters stashed away in coin jars and piggy banks all for Moore Elementary School.

“We picked Moore because it was one of the hardest hit schools and one of our teachers has a connection to a teacher there,” commented Cryer. Since the hurricane, a few, including Cryer, have been in contact with some from the Houston school via email and/or Skype.

In 2015, Moore Elementary had a student population of 1075, twenty-nine percent of which was categorized then as “economically disadvantaged”. Students and staff of Moore Elementary are now studying and teaching elsewhere in schools within their district.

“It was impressive to hear children talking about donating their personal accounts,” recalled WES Principal April Noble. “One child even said, ‘I'm giving them all my savings for a trip to Disney because they need this money more than I need to go to Disney.’”

Noble continued, “I'm impressed at how quickly staff responded to the disaster that occurred and how they embraced the school community to take part in this service learning.”

“It’s really sad that Texas just got hit and (some of) my family is down there...” said Abraham Medrano, a fourth grade student at WES who used to live in Dallas and once visited Moore Elementary School with his mother about two years ago.

According to collection organizers, the money will be converted into gift cards that Moore staff specifically requested in order to replenish needed school supplies and other items lost in the flooding.

“They’re in tough straits,” said teacher Pam Lear about the Houston school. Lear, whose 4th grade son Aiden was in the group of students to gather up their coins, indicated that the student coin collection was an exercise in “paying it forward” and learning more about showing kindness to others. “Compassion” is one of WES’s core values demonstrated and reinforced with students in assemblies and, often with real life situations in school and community.

A mix of 1st through 4th grade students who gave their coin savings for hurricane-damaged Moore Elementary School in Houston, Texas. As a result of Hurricane Harvey, Moore Elementary will be closed to students for up to a year for repairs.