Donation Totals
New Socks: 140 pairs
New underwear: 45 pairs
Knit hats: 5
mittens/knit gloves: 18 pairs
Hand/toe warmers: 39
Coats: 3
Sleeping bags: 5 new
Back Packs: 5
Smaller bags: 8
Deodorant sticks: 18
Soap: 10
Body butter: 1
Toothpaste: 2
Toiletry Kits: 11
bar of soap
toothbrush
toothpaste
washcloth
pancho
Combs: 12-pk
Condoms box
Mini notebooks: 5
mechanical pencils: 10
#2 pencils: 32
Glue sticks: 2
Crayons: 1 box
Pop-top cans of food: 25
Other cans of food: 14
Energy or Protein bars: 72
Chocolate bars: 12
Single-serve powdered drink mixes: 43
Jack Chan DVD, "Twin Dragons": 1*
Below is the accompanying article to this link HERE:
You know the kind of holiday gifts that make teens yawn? New socks, new underwear, gloves, deodorant. At A.F. High School, they make up the perfect list for a compassionate service project.
In one of its first actions, a high-school club is collecting supplies for the homeless youth. The Gay Straight Alliance, an American Fork High School club that aims to promote a respectful environment for all students, has recently set up a number of collection boxes for its winter service project.
The benefactors will be any of the 5,000 youth who experience homelessness each year in the Beehive State. Youth who are homeless have become a new focus nationally and in Utah because they fall easy prey to exploitation. Over a third of the youth will experience abuse after becoming homeless.
"Homeless youth experience an immense amount of dehumanization on a daily basis," said Cai Noble, who has lived on the streets as a youth and is now the founding director of Operation Shine America, an outreach organization that raises awareness of the homeless youth epidemic in America. "When we reach out to homeless youth with donations it not only saves lives; it shows homeless youth that others value them as a part of their community."
Rachel Peterson, a graduate student researcher at Utah State University, said that parental rejection is often the cause for youth homelessness. She once met a homeless 12-year-old boy who had told his family that he didn't fit into their belief system. The family told him to leave and to come back when he had his act together.
"Half of the youth report being kicked out of the family home because of their orientation or gender identity," said Peterson. They end up in squats, abandoned buildings or camp in canyons.
Now as the cold weather is fast approaching, the GSA high-school club is asking for help from the community. It is looking to collect new socks, new underwear, backpacks, sleeping bags, hand warmers, deodorant and pop-top cans of meat such as chili, single-serving powdered drink mix, chocolate bars and energy bars.
For the project, drop-off boxes have recently been placed in the school's main office, library, counseling office, room 104 and in several teachers' classrooms. Donations can be dropped off until Tuesday, Dec. 10. Then they will be delivered to a non-profit organization in Utah that works directly with homeless youth, OUTreach Resource Centers.
So, you thought you could never make a teen smile with a gift of just socks or underwear? The GSA of American Fork High School would like to convince you otherwise.
If You Can Donate...
Bring donations to A.F.H.S. Main Office until Dec. 10.
- New socks
- New underwear
- Backpacks
- Sleeping bags
- Hand warmers
- Deodorant
- Pop-top cans of meat
- Single-serving powdered drink mix
- Chocolate bars
- Energy bars
*{That's strange. It doesn't say anything about a Jackie Chan dvd.}
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| Salt Lake City Image Credit: Lennie Mahler | The Salt Lake Tribune |
