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Los Altos High School students, through the One Dollar For Life (ODFL) Program, are collecting calculators for students in secondary schools in Africa.
ODFL is a non-profit organization founded to address Third-World poverty by collecting one dollar from each of the millions of U.S. high school students. The organization channels those funds into small-scale infrastructure projects in developing countries. The non-profit has already spearheaded several projects that benefit students in impoverished nations.
Robert Freeman, the Los Altos High School instructor who helped found One Dollar For Life, said he recently asked a Nongovernmental Organization (NGO) representative, ODFL’s contact in Africa, if the group needed calculators.
“I have already been in touch with several principals and they are very excited about this offer,” Macheru Karuku, an official from the NGO in Kenya, wrote in an e-mail to Freeman. “They informed me that calculators are a requirement in secondary schools and it is the duty of the parents to provide (them). Many of them (parents) can hardly afford (calculators) because they earn less than a dollar a day.”
After confirming the need, students from ODFL and the high school Pi Club publicized the drive for used, working calculators, especially solar-operated models. They plan to ship the calculators to NGO representatives in Kenya and Malawi for distribution.
“It takes almost nothing from us to help people who are so much worse off than we are,” said Mandeep Chahal, senior and president of ODFL. “How can we not do it?”
In addition to the calculators, students are gathering money for shipping costs. Freeman said it would take $200 for shipping and customs costs.
Freeman reported that there is now an ODFL representative at 35 Santa Clara County high schools. He said that if the calculator drive goes well at Los Altos High, he would encourage the other ODFL-participating schools to sponsor similar drives.
The Los Altos students have expanded their collection to the broader community. Calculators can be dropped off at Room 313 at Los Altos High, 201 Almond Ave., until noon Friday.
For more information, visit http://odfl.org.
Contact Traci Newell at
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