Cardinal Mooney Student Helps Native Country

After traveling to Guatemala and witnessing the poverty in his native country, Cardinal Mooney Catholic High School student Juan Pablo Gonzalez was inspired to take action. Juan Pablo, a junior, saw the need that students have for basic supplies while visiting a public school.

Determined to help in any way that he could, Juan Pablo decided to launch a drive to collect and send backpacks and school supplies for children throughout Guatemala.

Juan Pablo says he contacted “Libros y Cuadernos con Corazón,” an alliance of charity organizations that prepares school kits for impoverished children in Guatemala to ask what supplies are needed. Juan Pablo then asked the director of education at the Diocese of Venice for permission to ask the principals of area diocesan schools, including Cardinal Mooney, if he could hold backpack collections at their schools.

“I set up collection boxes at the schools and was overwhelmed by the generosity of the students,” said Juan Pablo.

After collecting the donations, he and his friends boxed and prepared them for shipping. The supplies will arrive in Guatemala by the beginning of the new school year, which begins in January.  

“Collecting school supplies was extremely rewarding because it made me feel as if I’m part of something larger than my own life. I am blessed to have to ability to help the less fortunate and help pave the way for a more educated Guatemalan people so we can decrease the amount of poverty there,” said Juan Pablo.