Making art to make a difference

Kylie Melton, Baker Middle School eighth-grade student, helps prepare the Haiti House magnets she and others are selling to help earn money for Haitian earthquake victims’ support. (Submitted Photo)

An estimated 250,000 Haitians died in a Jan. 12 earthquake that left one of the world’s poorest countries in shambles.

Ginger Rembold, BMS art teacher, said she was browsing the Internet for a project that would allow her students to combine their art interest with service to others when she came across a Web site for the Haiti Houses Project.

Two Florida high school art teachers started the fundraiser in 2008 to help the people of Haiti even before the country was ravaged by this year’s earthquake, Rembold said. The Florida teachers promote the project with the slogan: “Tiny houses that make a BIG difference.”

“This was so perfect for an art class,” Rembold said. “It looked doable and the kids wanted to give it a try.”

Other than one can of polyurethane and $2 spent on magnets at Thatcher’s, Rembold said the “houses” were built entirely from scraps of construction paper and old magnets she had on hand. Marking pens were used to accent the individual features of each piece.

Students have been selling their artwork for $3 each during the past month.

As of Thursday morning, the 18 seventh- and eighth-graders in Rembold’s BMS art advisory class had sold 134 of their 250 magnets for a total of $402.

The class voted to send the money to Food for the Poor. The students learned through research that of all the charities involved in the effort, the organization directs the greatest percentage of its donations — 98 percent — to help the needy, Rembold said.

Seventh-grader Bailey Hill, 13, said he gained a sense of satisfaction from the fundraiser that will help the people living in poverty in Haiti.

“It made me feel important,” he said. “It made me feel good.”

And although Hill didn’t make many of the “houses,” he’s one of the top sellers in the class. By Thursday he’d raised $95, thanks to the generosity of friends, family and clients at Lavish Salon & Day Spa, owned by his mother, Jessica Hill.

Tanya O’Neal, 13, one of Hill’s seventh-grade classmates, is the other top seller, collecting $93 for the project, Rembold said.

Unlike Hill and O’Neal, 12-year-old seventh-grader Grant Ermovik said he preferred the creative side of the project.

He couldn’t recall if he’d sold even one of the magnets.

“I just liked making them,” he said.

Ermovik created 20 to 25 pieces of art for the fundraiser.

The BMS class is one of just three Oregon sites on the map included on the Haiti Houses Project’s Web site, which marks the location of all participants throughout the world. The art classes of Philomath High School and a Portland man are the only others in Oregon.

To view the map and learn more about the project, go to www.haitihouses.org.

According to the Web site, the Florida teachers used the Internet to garner new support for their project after January’s earthquake. Since then, hundreds of teachers, students, scout groups, churches and individuals have joined the effort.

Rembold said the magnets will remain on sale until the school year ends. She encourages the public to stop by the middle school office or call her at BMS at 541-524-2500 to purchase a magnet and join the effort to help the people of Haiti.