Organized by senior Sydni Jett, Darcy Kerrigan and Robert Stark came to Kingswood Oxford on Oct. 12, to talk about The Thirst Project, a non-profit organization that aims to to bring safe drinking water to communities around the world.
They started off the assembly by saying that the average person uses 150 gallons of water a day. They also stated that the problems that communities have limited water isn’t necessarily an environmental problem; it is a problem that we are creating. “[Our] environmental problem is actually a human problem,” Ms. Kerrigan said.
In parts of rural Swaziland, women and children have to walk up to four hours a day just to access water. Once the water is found, it is dirty and filled with disease. If it isn’t boiled, it makes people sick.
Even if it is boiled and sanitized to the best of their abilities, the threat of sickness is still great.
One of the problems that communities with little water face is HIV/AIDS. Clean water plays a huge role in solving this epidemic.
If it isn’t clean, however, the water will kill you faster than AIDS will.
That’s why the Thirst Project came to KO. The charity wants to make a change in places with less access to drinkable water than us, and so does senior Sydni Jett.
The Thirst Project is a nonprofit that donates 100 percent of profits made to help communities, especially in Swaziland, Africa, have suitable, safe drinking water.
The charity was started in 2008, by seven college students who wanted to make a change in the way that people were being forced to live.
Sydni heard about the charity over the summer and instantly knew she wanted to do something to help.
The solution she found was to make a club at KO dedicated to raising money for the Thirst Project to build a well in Swaziland.
She wanted to bring this issue to KO because she didn’t realize how much water she was truly using and taking for granted. She has lots of goals for the club, both long term and short term.
“My long term goal is to raise $12,000 which will build a well in Swaziland.” Syndi said. “My short term goal is to have our community get involved and be aware of the water crisis.”
The assembly started with a quick introduction, and then they shared an informative video showing a college student who had actually traveled to Africa to help build the well that she had raised money to build.
The video proved to be heartbreaking and provoked lots of emotions from students.
“I was very nervous that people weren’t going to pay attention” Sydni said, “but watching the video was very engaging and touching. Many people came up to me afterwards saying the video made them cry.”
Sydni said she hopes that the KO community will take a lot out of this assembly and work hard to make a change for places that need it.
The club she started has big plans on how they are going to make a change.
