Montana Teens Bring Wheelchairs to Poor Kids in Mexico Gail Schontzler - Bozeman Daily Chronicle | |
go to original April 3, 2012 |
A group (from left, Janice Kai, Chylo Laszloffy, Vic, Paul Barmore) with a therapist (far right) working on adjusting a child's chair. (Valerie McMakin)
For Quade Yenny, a senior at Heritage Christian School in Bozeman, the high point of his spring-break visit to Mexico was delivering a wheelchair to a little boy named Abraham.
“He didn’t speak English, but he just smiled when he was able to sit in a chair the first time,” Yenny said. “It definitely melts your heart.”
Yenny was one of 14 students and adults who traveled from the Gallatin Valley to Sonora, Mexico, to deliver wheelchairs from the Bozeman nonprofit ROC Wheels.
They gave 34 wheelchairs to children, most around age 6, who couldn’t walk because of cerebral palsy, spinal bifida and other health problems, said Lee Ann Hanson. She co-founded ROC Wheels with her husband, Wayne, in 1999.
Some of the Mexican families they met were so poor that they live in sheds made from corrugated metal and cardboard with no electricity or clean running water.
Mothers and fathers who had no wheelchairs struggle to carry their children from place to place as the children grow older, said Valerie McMakin, a junior at Bozeman High School.
“We saw parents carry a 15-year-old, so getting a wheelchair was a huge advantage,” McMakin said. “We saw people crying, out of joy.”
Since 1999, the Christian faith-based nonprofit has brought wheelchairs to children with disabilities in Kenya, Romania, Peru, the West Bank, Israel, Jamaica, Russia, Ukraine, Iraq, China, Morocco, Haiti, Tanzania and Mali.
The program involving students is called YEWTHS ROC, which stands for Youth Empowered with The Helper Spirit Reach Out and Care.
Ten of the 34 wheelchairs were paid for by students from Gallatin Valley schools. Shop class students at Belgrade’s middle and high schools have been building the wheelchairs, Hanson said.
Students at Bozeman’s Chief Joseph Middle School made cloth bags for the children in Mexico. Belgrade art students painted little wooden rocking horses to give away as toys. The group also brought candy and soccer balls.
“It really touches your heart to see these kids who don’t have much of anything,” said Mary Ruth Prescott, a Belgrade High sophomore.
Once in Mexico, the students visited two rural villages and a town, San Carlos, on the Sea of Cortez. Students assembled wheelchairs, measured the children and helped as a therapist adjusted the chairs to each child. The wheelchairs can be adjusted to grow as the child grows, Hanson said.
Maegan Miller of Manhattan High and Janice Kai of Belgrade High said they had traveled with ROC Wheels once before to Jamaica, bringing wheelchairs to children in an orphanage. Miller said she left Mexico feeling more hopeful for the children because they have parents who love them.
The students each raised $1,200 for the trip. They did so by bagging groceries at Town & Country Foods and holding a pony raffle. Kai, whose family is Navajo, danced Native American dances at the Christmas Stroll to raise donations.
It costs $350 to buy or sponsor one ROC wheelchair, compared to $3,000 to $5,000 for a similar chair on the retail market, Hanson said.
“I’m incredibly proud of this team,” Hanson said. “It’s an amazing group that has the heart to reach out and care. There’s so much joy the children fit in the wheelchair give to us. It’s just amazing to see that love go back and forth.”
Also on the trip were Chylo Laszloffy, a Montana State University student, Sarah Laszloffy, parent Cheryl Kai, Abigail and Paul Barmore, Mariah Price, Clare Cory, and Naomi Jensen. More information is on the group’s website.
Gail Schontzler can be reached at gails@dailychronicle.com
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