Teachers. Textbooks. Education.
Privileges that are easy to take for granted.
Yet, in some areas of countries such as Ghana and Guatemala, children do not have access to the basic education, resources, and learning benefits we see every day.
One group that aims to fix this problem is Dream Volunteers Club. Dream Volunteers Club strives to reach out to less fortunate children through summer volunteering trips and fundraising to donate scholarships to the children in need.
Inspired by Dream Volunteers, a local volunteer organization, the club presidents, sophomores Andrew Ghazouli and Amisha Nambiar, created their own club hoping to gain participation from their fellow peers. During the monthly meetings, the club presidents inform club members about different summer volunteering opportunities coming up and discuss possible service projects.
According to Humanium, an international child sponsorship striving to end violations of children’s rights, more than 72 million children around the world continue to stay unschooled. This is often due to high poverty rates and undeveloped countries that do not have the ability to allocate education for all.
Trevor Koto, a sophomore and club member, considers how a lack of education could poorly affect the development of young generations.
“Education is such a vital part of life, and I hope we can all continue to help those who are less fortunate than us,” Koto said.
In order to help out those who are less fortunate, inspired youth take on trips to these areas and focus on giving back. Some volunteers focus on development projects, such as setting up tutoring centers in Jaipur, India, and establishing recycling centers in Costa Rica. Others join women empowerment programs for the less fortunate girls to help spark hope for their futures.
“We take a lot of things for granted that some children don’t even dream about,” said Jayden Kollman, a freshman.
Dream Volunteers refer to the children around the world who do not have the financial means to travel and explore the world as “Young Dreamers.” These kids are sometimes granted scholarships to attend schools and universities through different forms of fundraising and donations.
The members of Dream Volunteers Club contribute to this operation by selling chocolate at Carlmont and giving all the proceeds to the Young Dreamers.
In the near future, the club presidents want to communicate more with Young Dreamers from different countries.
Recently, the club got a video from the Young Dreamers of Ghana about their newly installed system of Ecobricks. These bricks are created from combining used plastic into plastic water bottles and later used as building blocks.
While preparing for this summer’s trips, club members are currently hoping to participate in local volunteering events to help benefit our community as well.
“I hope more students would go on these service trips and help fundraise because sometimes we just don’t understand how fortunate we are,” Nambiar said.
