After spending months gathering money for their annual prom, a group of Brummana High School (BHS) students has decided to donate the amount they had amassed to the hungry of Lebanon.
Throughout the past school year, Anna Diba, the head of the BHS Prom Committee, alongside her fellow students and committee members, had been striving to raise the needed funds to organize the last gathering of the school’s senior students.
The Committee had spent much time and effort to organize numerous events and activities, including bake sales, Christmas goodie bags, Valentine’s Day roses, and others to finally collect 1.8 million Lebanese pounds by early Spring.
BHS teachers, students, and staff all lent a helping hand for the Committee to ensure their senior students get a memorable sendoff.
However, after their work was over, the Committee members realized that the school year would not end the way they had expected it to.
Alas, the COVID-19 situation prevented the BHS Prom Committee from organizing their school’s traditional celebratory dance event.
Coincidentally, having observed the ugly outcomes of the economic crisis manifesting all around them, the students decided to put the money to good use by donating it to the local hunger relief initiative, FoodBlessed.
Every Saturday, the volunteers of FoodBlessed gather to pack food assistance packages containing basic food commodities to be delivered to the struggling families that need them, all thanks to the money they raise every week from individual donors.
Wasting no time, on Saturday, May 30th, Anna and her sister Clara, alongside BHS’s Marketing Manager, Mr. Richard Bampfylde, volunteered with FoodBlessed and helped put together the rations that would help vulnerable families.
The group eagerly helped FoodBlessed box 166 rations, 25 of which were donated by the BHS Prom Committee and would feed 25 families for a full month.
To thank the volunteering group, Co-founder Maya Terro and the rest of the present FoodBlessed volunteers surprised them with a cake depicting graduation hats, gowns, and notices.
On the contribution, Mr. Bampfylde told The961, “It was an amazing and unforgettable experience for the BHS team to be part of such a caring community and to invest its energy into it.”
For the BHS’s students and Prom Committee, “unity among the citizens of Lebanon is what will help the population survive these extremely difficult times,” he said.
They hope to inspire other students and citizens to partake in similar charitable initiatives and help alleviate the unspoken pain that innumerable people go through in Lebanon, every waking minute.
The Committee urges the prom committees of other schools to follow suit and donate their money to NGOs and social aid initiatives.
On that note, Maya Terro, the co-founder and executive director of FoodBlessed, said that what the senior high schoolers of BHS did “embodies the true meaning of giving.”
“…They could have easily taken their money back but, instead, they donated it to FoodBlessed! I hope their movement to give back to those in need in the community catches on,” she added.
FoodBlessed works with strategic partners, including food and non-food companies, to deliver surplus food recovered through events, such as food drives and fundraisers, to non-profit partners and families that need it.
Thanks to the efforts of its passionate volunteers and the kind donations of hundreds of contributors, the likes of BHS’s students, FoodBlessed has helped serve over 700,000 meals across Lebanon to people who desperately needed them.
Each aid box costs the organization $20 and is, on average, enough to feed a family of 4 for a month. You can help combat hunger in Lebanon by donating to FoodBlessed here.
