Reported in WickedLocal:
The Greenhouse School students submit vegetables plucked from their backyard gardens into the Topsfield Fair every year.
“We grow vegetables and herbs like tomatoes, eggplants, bell peppers, thyme and basil,” said Michaela Traore, seated at a desk in the school’s main classroom. “We started planting in May, and they grew over the summer.”
Alongside submitting the vegetables, students compete in the fair’s poster and pumpkin-decorating contests. And doing so in 2017, like years past, proved lucrative – with the children winning ribbons and prize money, as the dozens of check stubs teacher Julia Nambalirwa-Lugudde fanned out on a desk Friday revealed.
“We owned the fair,” said Nambalirwa-Lugudde’s husband, Greenhouse School Principal Danny Welch.
“We got the most ribbons for sure,” his wife added.
“So we also won the most ribbons’ contest,” Welch shot back.
They laughed, but the pair is, obviously, not only proud of their 20 students’ showing at the fair, but also their selflessness. The checks (some as low as $6 while others as high as $30) arrived in the mail and collectively added up to an adorable $138, a fortune in the children’s’ eyes, but the students selflessly settled on donating it to their Puerto Rico relief efforts.
Since Hurricane Maria wrecked havoc on the Unites State territory in September, the Greenhouse School almost immediately began collecting non-perishable food items, batteries, flashlights, diapers and air mattresses, among other items.
In its wake, the Category 5 hurricane caused an estimated $1 billion in catastrophic damage and spawned a humanitarian crisis. Millions found themselves in three feet of water – brought on by storm surges – and without power.
“Sixty percent of the island still doesn’t have access to clean water,” said Welch, standing in the school’s backyard as students played basketball, water plants, rode bicycles around him. “They need everything.”
Recovery has been slow and is anticipated to last years. As of Friday, thousand were still powerless. Welch even said they heard of kids still “sleeping on moldy, soggy mattresses.”
“I’m glad that were helping people,” offered up student Rowan King. “It’s going to be hard for them to get the lights back on.”
To restore full power, Welch said, “They think it will take six months.”
The whole situation – while hundreds of miles away – hit close to home. The Loring Avenue school claims deep roots in Puerto Rico, says Welch: “Over half of our students enrolled trace ancestry to the island.”
The students marched in the Haunted Happenings Grand Parade with a Puerto Rico flag in a show of solidarity.
The biggest hurdle has not been collecting donations but rather shipping, including the cost for shipping.
“They are having problems getting it there, and once it’s there, sorting it all,” said Welch.
The school’s saving grace came when a former parent dropped off a check for $1,000, “a huge deal,” says Welch. That donation help bring the total monetary donations to $1,700.
The first bulk of supplies the Greenhouse School shipped cost $650 and weighed 500 pounds. The donated items went to communities outside San Juan where members of the school claim relatives and direct connections, said Welch. He added a lion share of relief efforts have zeroed in on the island’s capitol.
“We realize this is a very modest effort and there are many similar groups organizing,” Welch and Nambalirwa-Lugudde wrote in a flier promoting donations. “We think it is important for many reasons, but principally for students to learn firsthand the importance of international solidarity and people-to-people organizing.”
To donate, visit http://www.greenhouseschool.org and click the donate button the right-hand side. Once can also send a check via mail, 145 Loring Ave., Salem, MA 01970. And with either method, specify the donation is for “PUERTO RICO RELIEF.”