A Grove of Change

I have some exciting news about some of the impact the Hendricks Foundation has had abroad.

My journey to complete this goal started back in February. I emailed a few high schools in Jamaica with the ambition of getting a letter from every school by September. Happy Grove was the first school to answer my call.

They also gave me an opportunity to speak with Principal Facey. I told Principal Facey I would like the opportunity to speak with her pupils and possibly give out a few computers to them as well. She was more than happy to give me the opportunity to make an impact. I prepared six computers for my travels. I boarded my plane in Detroit and landed in Montego Bay. I spent my first week preparing the computers to go out to the students and visiting a few of the lovely beaches. I spoke to Principal Facey of Happy grove and set out a date with her to come and speak to her students.

That day came on July 18th. Principal Facey gave me a small tour of the school. At around 10 o’clock I spoke with the students about the importance of their choices and how their future starts today. I gave them an example of how powerful the choice you make can be. I asked for one volunteer a young man was the only one to raise his hand. I immediately awarded him with one of the computers that I carried. The other students became eager to volunteer after that. I had 8 of them split into two groups of 4. We played a little game of Jamaican Jeopardy. The winning side received 4 computers. For the last computer I had the students guess my age; the winner guessed 25.

At the end one student came up in front of the class and told her peers about the importance of choosing the right friends. She piggy backed off of the talking points that I covered earlier and sunk her point into all of our thoughts.

After a short Q and A, I spoke with the 6 students who received computers. They told me thank you more times than I could count. One of them expressed to me how badly they needed these computers. Exams for them are just around the corner. They said they were praying for a computer to come their way and finally “today” happened. I was taken aback. I know that what we are doing is having a great impact, but I rarely get to personally hear the details of how I and my team are affecting the lives of others. It is the moments like these that I live for.

Thank you to all our donors for being a part of this journey up to now. I can’t wait to see where else we go in the future.

A special thanks to my team members Principal Facey and Happy Grove High School for making this opportunity a reality.