Michael Miller
When Newport Heights Elementary School started a drive to benefit
tsunami victims, Jesse and Matthew Torres didn't hesitate to join.
Returning home from school one day, they and classmate Hunter Durante
made lemonade in the kitchen and carted a wagon full of it to Santa
Ana Avenue. They had only a handmade sign asking "Help the tsunami
victims," but advertising wasn't a problem.
"People were throwing money at them," said their mother, PTA
President Terry Torres. "They didn't even want the lemonade. They
made $25 in one hour, and then they brought it back in a bag and
said, 'Mom, can you give this to [principal] Mr. Suhr?'"
As it turned out, donations of many kinds -- from lemonade stands
to piggy banks to checkbooks -- flowed into Newport Heights'
fundraising program. On Friday, during the weekly Flag Day ceremony
on the field, the student council presented a check for $2,125 to
Bill Sharp, the director of the Sumatra Surfzone Relief Operation.
Sharp, the father of two Newport Heights students, started
Surfzone Relief last January to benefit residents of Sumatra, an
island of Indonesia. Twice, Sharp and his group -- composed of people
in the local surfing industry -- have traveled by boat to Sumatra to
deliver food, medical aid and other needed supplies. The money raised
by Newport Heights students will go toward two needs: supplies for
the island's remote schoolhouses and for canoeing and fishing
equipment.
Sharp, who said the students' donations "brought tears to my
eyes," has personally visited the types of schools in Sumatra that
the funds will benefit.
"It's structurally very different from here, but spiritually the
same," Sharp said. "They don't have beautiful air-conditioned
classrooms. They mostly have a shack with a mat on it.
"But it's the same thing. They have a teacher and maybe 20
students. They have books and a white board to write the lesson on.
They don't have a district, but each village has a school structure."
Sumatra, located next to Malaysia, was devastated by the tidal
waves that hit on Dec. 26 last year. While the island itself may be
unknown to most American grade-schoolers, at least one Newport
Heights student had a personal connection to the tsunami tragedy.
"I was devastated because my aunt lives in Thailand," said
sixth-grader Cooper Scott, the student council president. "We didn't
hear from her for two weeks after the tsunamis. She was fine, because
she lives in the gulf."
At first, principal Kurt Suhr and fourth-grade teacher Quinn
