Soriente to Bring 66,222 Examples of WHS Spirit to Haiti

Westfield High School science teacher Sara Soriente's bags are packed and she is prepared to bring a 66,222 examples of the WHS spirit with her to Haiti next week.

Soriente is spending her spring break in Haiti working with a private foundation to rebuild the country following January's earthquake. She recently received her assignment, of rebuilding a school near the border with the Dominican Republic and has focused her work this past week in getting the high school students in to the spirit of helping Haiti.

Soriente received a briefing letter regarding the various items she needed to bring for her trip, including a recommendation to bring bandaids to distribute to the Haitian community. She decided instead of buying some and bringing on her own, she would try to get donations from the WHS community.

"I tend to do things in extreme," she said.

Soriente targeted students in the Project 79 program she teaches in to receive donations and also reached out to her fellow teachers to increase the donations. Other WHS teachers got into the act, promoting creative ways to encourage donations from students. One teacher offered to bake for her students in they brought in bandaids.

"It started with two boxes on Tuesday morning and now I don't know what I have gotten myself into," Soriente said.

Soriente said that when she was doing the final tallies on Friday she was amazd by the total amount. She noted that many students said they could not find bandaids in Westfield.

Soriente devoted Friday, the day before spring break, to Haiti in her classes. She asked her students to create the outlines of coloring projects and then place their names on it. During mid afternoon breaks from the action in Haiti, when extreme heat will halt school construction efforts, Soriente will have the Haitian children color the projects. She will then bring them back with her to Westfield and return them to the students so they have a piece of Haiti.

In addition, Soriente's classes spent part of Friday helping her ready the bandaids to transport them to Haiti. She said she's been hearing a positive feedback in the hallways of WHS.

"Kids are coming to me with smiles on their faces and saying 'thank you for doing this,'" Soriente said.