News and images of the devastating Jan. 12 earthquake in Haiti affected people across the world, but the impact was especially deep for University junior Hannah Carr.
Carr spent part of her summer in Haiti, helping to organize medical supplies and prepare rooms for improvements in a new hospital in the nation’s
capital, Port-au-Prince.
“I was just heartbroken,” Carr said. “You wonder if your friends are OK, and you wonder if everything is still there.”
It took Carr three days to learn that the hospital was still standing and that the friends she made during her stay had survived. But it only took a few hours to plant the seeds of action. Katherine Philipson, a fellow member of the campus group Students for Global Health, called to ask what Carr planned to do to help.
Three weeks later, Carr, Philipson and scores of other students have become part of ongoing drives to help Haitians, which have raised thousands of dollars from University students and community members.
The earthquake, its aftershocks and the resulting chaos in Haiti killed as many as 300,000 people, according to the latest estimates. The quake also leveled many of the buildings in Port-au-Prince, it has been reported. Foreign governments and organizations have spent millions to aid the wounded and the massive rebuilding effort the country will require.
Aid at the University can be but a small part of that, but students participating in fundraising efforts said it could still be significant.
So far, Students for Global Health has raised more than $1,800, organizers estimate, with more fundraisers planned for the coming week. The group has already spent time soliciting donations on campus and hosted one fundraiser at the Pizza Research Institute, with half a dozen more to follow.
A shirt designed by members of the group is also on sale at the University Duck Store and has already raised nearly $1,400 for the aid group Partners in Health, which members of Students for Global Health have described as the best aid organization for Haiti because of its deep connections in the country. The shirt’s designer, freshman Greg Mills, and freshman Marcus Harvey, who helped him deal with the Duck Store, said the store had agreed to pay for the cost of manufacturing the shirts.
Philipson said the group hoped to raise as much as $10,000 for the relief effort.
Students for Global Health is not the only campus organization whose members are raising money in the wake of the tragedy. The University’s Black Student Union and Movimiento Chicano Estudiantil de Aztlan, a Chicano student group, are also selling T-shirts whose proceeds go to benefit disaster victims. The ASUO Executive and University president’s office have also contributed to the production costs.
Students have also made independent efforts to help raise funds. Senior David Zahn said he was inspired to help the Haiti relief efforts by a reading he and friend Jon Kam studied in a political science class. After putting together posters and collection jars, they began asking for small donations on the corner of East 13th Avenue and Kincaid Street.
Zahn, Kam and University economics major Corey Smith secured a contract with the Red Cross and spent a total of seven hours on the corner on the afternoons of Jan. 13 and Jan. 15. During that time, Zahn said, they raised about $1,500, mostly in $1 donations.
“It wasn’t really a big deal,” Zahn said. “It’s only a dollar. People spend more money
on coffee.”
Those organizing fundraising efforts said they were impressed with the spontaneity of students’ efforts to help.
“Seeing how things can blossom, it’s given me faith in people,” Harvey said.
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