HSFL’s newly solidified relationship with the Hope for Children Fund brings High Schoolers for Front Liners to the international stage. Launched through the monthly project in December, HSFL focused on children’s centers and orphanages throughout the world, bringing homemade masks to new community centers. Their work includes specialized packaging — masks wrapped in the style of presents — along with children’s designs and adapted children sized masks.
HSFL discovered the Hope for Children Fund through online research and the desire to give communities with specialized needs additional support. They are dedicated to “improving the quality of life of vulnerable children in Ethiopia by supporting local community-based organizations that provide for the children’s basic needs, offer them educational opportunities, keep them healthy, and build their skills so they can be self-sufficient and successful adults.” Now conducted for over 16 years, the non-profit aims to alleviate economic situations for those suffering from extreme poverty.
HSFL has already diversified from hospitals to include detention centers within their mask donations as these“facilities face significant challenges in controlling the spread of highly infectious pathogens such as SARS-CoV-2.” According to the CDC, their intensified challenges include “crowded dormitories, shared lavatories, limited medical and isolation resources, daily entry and exit of staff members and visitors, continual introduction of newly incarcerated or detained persons, and transport of incarcerated or detained persons in multi person vehicles for court-related, medical, or security reasons.”
Inspired by the same desire to help those in need, HSFL made and donated three hundred masks to handed them off to Ms. Carol Rhees, founder of the Hope for Children Fund. Her work allows HSFL to reach the New Bright Community Development Center in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia who have limited access to medical supplies.
Fortunately, their work has been received extremely positively in Ethiopia. Rhees explains “the students [in Ethiopia] LOVED the masks” and are excited to receive even more. Currently, HSFL plans to reach out to more orphanages abroad and continue to donate to the Hope for Children Fund. They have also contacted The Children’s Home in Catonsville, MD to deliver another December Mask special to the children there.
For more information about the Hope for Children Fund and their work, please visit https://www.hopeforchildrenfund.org/
Written by Allison Moon
December 23th, 2020
