Freshmen Girls On Mission To Bring Clean Water To Remote Village

Most freshmen spend their first year of high school concerning themselves with adjusting to the new environment -- finding classes, navigating their new school, meeting and making new friends.

But a group of girls who are freshmen at Red Bank Regional and Rumson-Fair Haven high schools are taking on a far bigger project: the seven are boarding a plane and heading to the Dominican Republic to build an aqueduct to bring clean water to a remote village.

The girls, who call their group HereToHelp, are headed to the Dominican Republic Nov. 4.

The trip was inspired by the efforts of Brian Campolattaro, a Rumson resident and an eye doctor who has been traveling to the country for 14 years with ILAC (Institute for Latin American Concern) to perform vision-restoring eye surgery for people who live there.

ILAC was started in 1980 to teach health and agriculture techniques to the people of the Dominican Republic. The center serves almost 500,000 of the poorest citizens and many of them have the opportunity to receive life-saving surgery from the doctors present free of charge, according to the organization.

Campolattaro’s daughter, Mara, who attended Red Bank Regional, has long wanted wanted to go along and help. This year, she came up with the idea of going to help the villagers in another way, and her friends and their fathers agreed to join in.

In addition to the plan to build the aqueduct, the girls are collecting new and gently used clothing to take to the people of the village they will be helping. They also are raising funds to pay for the materials, local construction expertise and transportation to and from the compound outside of Santiago where we will be staying.

The girls’ families are paying the travel expenses to and from the Dominican Republic.

The girls have received help from classmates and clubs at both Red Bank Regional and at Rumson-Fair Haven High School, with the Spanish National Honor Society at Rumson, led by Spanish teacher Christine Gauss, donating $500 from a recently held a car wash to help fund the construction of the aqueduct.

If you would to help the girls on their mission, they have set up a GoFundme page. Click here to make a donation.

(Standing, left to right: Olivia Turi, Maddie Orr, Paige Borden, Hannah Horan, Annabel Morris, and Caroline Healey. Seated in wheelbarrow: Mara Campolattaro. Photo courtesy of HereToHelp)