Updated: Sixth Grade Students Raise Money For Clean Water Charity

Update: October 22, 2019

On Sunday, October 20, the girls were able to drop off their collected shoes with a truck driver who graciously offered to transport all of the donations on his way to St. Louis. The driver had a personal connection to Shoe Crew Water as he grew up in Ghana in a village where it was 12 miles to the nearest place for their drinking water. He first heard of the operation over 10 years ago, about how it was possible to turn tennis shoes into money for water wells in underdeveloped nations.

The girls were able to drop off 16 bags full of shoes in the truck. They were filled with joy and excitement after meeting the driver and hearing his real-life testament as to how critical these shoes are to providing clean and living water!

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October 8, 2019

Sixth grade students Anne Bradley Maxwell, Elizabeth Barrett, Fiona Callahan, and Caroline Stickney teamed up to create a service project challenge for the Wesleyan middle school this fall. For several years, Anne Bradley has asked friends to donate money to clean water charities instead of giving her birthday presents. This year, for her twelfth birthday, she chose to partner with Shoe Crew Water.

Shoe Crew Water is able to turn shoes into clean water through a creative process. The organization accepts gently used shoes that normally would end up in a landfill, and then resells the shoes to markets in developing countries. The money from the shoe sales and donations to Shoe Crew Water become the source funding for building wells in places around that world that don’t have access to clean water. The organization also has missionaries who share the Gospel, and what led them to serve Christ, through local churches in those areas. After they provide a sustainable water source to drink, and give them the good news of Jesus, they also teach about sanitation and hygiene to make a lasting impact on their health.

In August, Anne Bradley and her friends were able to donate 80 pairs of shoes and almost $200 from just one small gathering. Once back at school for the fall, middle school principal Joseph Antonio and the sixth grade chairs Laura Siron and Justin Krueger issued the IMPACT Challenge, which challenged students to think about ways they could make an impact on the school and the world. Anne Bradley, Elizabeth, Fiona, and Caroline took the challenge to heart, and decided to expand their partnership with Shoe Crew Water to the rest of the middle school by starting a shoe drive.

The shoe drive that these sixth grader’s are starting will last two weeks, and they hope to have 192 pairs of shoes donated.When asked about the goal, Elizabeth said, “Our goal is to have 192 shoes, but really any amount is what matters. If it’s one person or 1000 we don’t care. We just want clean water for as many people as we can help.”

The drive will go from October 7th – 18th. Shoe donations can be accepted in any of the boxes located on the middle school grade-level hallways of Wesley Hall.




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