York Town News
Little helpers strive to make a difference
By Jennifer L. Saunders
YORK - Band-Aids. Vitamins. Thermometers. Latex gloves.These hardly sound like items that would be difficult to come by in any school nurse's office or even most homemade First Aid kits, but for doctors treating the people of rural villages in Africa, such items are precious and few.
Enter Jordan McKie, a preschool student at Jack and Jill Nursery School, who decided to reach out to her classmates to help collect medical supplies for the children of Kenya.
While Jordan's four- and five-year-old classmates learned about Africa and found it on the map, they asked their parents to help by taking them to purchase supplies to help with an effort shared by Jack and Jill, York Hospital, Atlantic Dental and others to support the work of Maria Solomon.
Solomon, whose sister Paula Hoy resides in the local area, is at work on a grant to aid medical humanitarian missions to Kenya, Jordan's mother, Carrie McKie, explained.
"The purpose of these missions is to provide medical care to the neediest populations: to those having little or no access to medical care," Solomon wrote in a recent draft of her grant proposal.
Since December of 2005, five missions have been conducted, treating more than 1,600 individuals as of last month.
"To date, the personnel involved in these missions - from drivers to mechanics to cooks to medical and paramedical staff - have all been volunteers. All medications have been furnished by Atlantic Londongate (a British-Mauritanian insurance company). Its partners, SOGECO, Atlantic Motors and La Palmeraie have provided vital logistics support," Solomon wrote.
More missions are planned for the future, and Jack and Jill Nursery School Director Bertha Rocray said her students plan to keep their connection to Kenya and continue helping the children there.
"We're going to be able to keep this project going," Rocray told the children last week as they prepared to send out their first boxes of supplies to Africa.
Jordan's project is something of a family tradition as her older sister, Maddie, collected dental supplies for children in Africa when she was a student at Jack and Jill.
After singing their good-morning song on Friday, the children at Jack and Jill talked about what the project means to them.
"They live far away," said Sophie Trafton of the children who will be helped by their donations.
Lily Brodsky agreed, adding, "It's really hot there."
"They don't have medicine or Band-Aids," said Bella Tidd.
Jordan said she likes helping other people, and added that her mom would be arranging with Solomon to share a DVD to be made by the doctors volunteering to help those in need.
When asked if they would like to go to Africa to help people in need when they grow up, the response was an overwhelming "Yes."
