But what makes Libby so cool is that she has used her love for baking as a way to raise money to bring clean water to a community in Africa.  Muffin Mondays she calls them.

Every Monday since early October Libby has delivered freshly baked muffins to the Teacher’s Room at her school in Harrison.  Flavors vary each week and have included Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip, Granola, Blueberry, and Cinnamon Apple Crumble.  Wrapped in clear plastic wrap so the tantalizing goodness can be seen, each muffin is labeled with this equally clear message … these muffins don’t only taste good, they DO good.

They taste good, and do good!

Each muffin is only $1, but that $1 is a gateway to clean water.  Libby’s loyal teachers and fans have been doing their part by ordering their muffins each week, and Libby and her family are gaining momentum toward their goal to fund a well.

What about the rest of Libby’s family?  Well, Dad holds the invaluable (and lucky) role of being an official taste tester; and sister Maggie is helping out in the kitchen measuring out yummy ingredients.  The inspiration of all this family fun?  Libby’s Grandmother, who has seen first-hand the need for clean water during mission trips to Africa.  Her stories shared with Mother Meg and Granddaughter Libby stirred up the passion for clean water that led the Graham family to bake treats that will turn into taps (or more likely pumps) of clean water.

So my only question?  If Monday’s are for muffins, what about Tuesday and the rest of the week?!

To track Libby’s progress, see the family fundraising page here: http://thewaterproject.org/community/profile/meg-graham

That’s the goal, every day, for the Lowe family from Abilene, Texas.

We met Matt, Amy and their two children, Liam and Mary when they called recently about starting a fundraising page so that Liam, pictured here with Dad, could love people by helping build wells in Africa.

As we read through Liam’s page, we met a remarkable young man who has spent many months over the last year battling leukemia in a Texas hospital.  Things had been going well.  Liam had even recently been home for a month in Abilene, in remission.

But Liam soon spiked a fever that just wouldn’t go away.  While checking up on the fever and a few other symptoms in the emergency room, they discovered his cancer was back.

The Lowe family returned to the hospital for more treatment and by July 29th, Liam had been back in the hospital for a few days with plenty of his own concerns.  But, apparently, worrying about himself isn’t what helps Liam through the day.

Dad and Liam were sitting together that day talking instead about how some children don’t have the food and water they need.  They wondered why some of those children have to work instead of going to school.  As they talked about how they could love others,  Liam decided to give some of his own money to help people in need get food and water.  He gave part of his money to buy chickens; and the other part he wanted to donate to bring clean water to children who are in need.  But that still wasn’t enough.

Liam’s a big thinker. His big goal was to fund two entire wells in Africa!  So the Lowe family set the goal of raising $13,500, the average cost of two wells in many of the countries where The Water Project works.  Amy was sure they could meet this goal.  They are surrounded by loving family and friends…who all lent a hand.

Remarkably, only two weeks later,  Liam had reached his goal!  Within days, the local paper heard of Liam and his acts of love and published a great story about this young hero.  The day the article ran, Liam’s original page received even more donations, this time from new friends the Lowe’s have never met. Taking a cue from Liam’s younger friends, who donated amounts like $4.25, $6.68 and $5.17,  many folks seemingly emptied their piggy banks to help Liam raise more than he dreamed.

Everyone seems eager to follow the example of this courageous boy.  Liam inspires.   In the midst of fighting his own battle with cancer, he is strong enough to create hope in the lives of others – half a world away.  All by simply living each day to create, to learn and to love.

We have all learned a lot from Liam.  So, that leaves the rest of today to create and to love…

Students at Southwest Chicago Christian School in Tinley Park, Illinois have been learning about the lack of clean water available to people throughout the world.   As Principal Terry Huizenga wrote, “After hearing that one out of every six people in the world do not have access to clean water and that often women and young children walk more than five miles a day in order to obtain water, students decided to take action.”

In the spirit of the school’s vision statement, “A Christ-Centered Learning Community Intent on Restoring God’s World,” the students raised $26,000.   Students ranging from kindergarten to eighth grade participated in a walkathon in the fall of the 2010-2011 school year, with the purpose of raising awareness and funds for people in developing nations who lack safe drinking water.  The result?  Four communities will have clean water … three in Kenya, and one in Rwanda.  Now that’s faith in action.

But the students didn’t stop at fundraising; they also took time to care about the communities on a greater level.  “As Southwest Christian partnered with the Water Project for this important work, they have also been praying that the communities who receive the wells will come to know the love of Christ through their gift of clean water. “, says Principal Huizenga.

Check out the well projects in Kenya and Rwanda that are possible because of students taking action and making a difference:

See their Projects Here

You can host a walkathon in your community too.  Contact us for a guide of helpful tips to planning this type of event.

We may never know… but Kevin Cline and friends sure got our attention with this one.  You simply have to watch!

You may be wondering…

Was this a waste of water? Maybe.   But, here’s a stunner.  A 10 hour shower only uses about 1,500 gallons of water.  That’s less than is needed to produce one hamburger!*

So, we think it was worth it.  Kevin raised over $1,000 in just 10 hours.  You can see how the 1,500 gallons was put to good use here >>

*Source: http://ga2.er.usgs.gov/edu/edu-activity-watercontent.cfm

Silver, who lives in Utah, is making a difference – one ‘facebadge’ at a time.  His Dad, Justin, tells us that Silver “…saw a PSA about kids drinking water from mud puddles. He got really mad …”

When something makes you mad, it’s often a sign that there is something wrong, something that needs to change.  Silver sure understands that principle, because he took his ‘mad’ and turned it into action.  Now, Silver and Justin (also known as Papa Silver) have a Facebook page where they sell Silver’s mini works of art to help others.

What is a ‘face badge’?  We didn’t know either…  So we checked it out (and you should too).  Silver draws happy faces, sad faces, scary faces, angry faces; and with the help of his Dad makes them into laminated pins that you can wear as a badge with the emotion of your choice.  You can order one yourself!  We sure did…

And the next time you feel discouraged that you can’t do anything about the problems we face as a global community, look over at that facebadge you got from Silver and be reminded,  no one is too young (or too old) to make a difference.  And no effort is too small to count.

Here is Silver and Papa Silver’s Facebook page… check it out!

http://www.facebook.com/facebadge

At Rockford High School, Junior Makenzie Connor (‘Kenzie’ to friends and family) doesn’t just do good for others 7000 miles away from Rockford… she does good for people in her own backyard.

Makenzie got involved with The Water Project after selecting clean water as her topic for a speech class. Through her Internet research she found The Water Project web site.  “I didn’t really plan on fundraising, but then afterwards I got started and now I’ve raised almost $1300.”, says Makenzie.  In all 90 classrooms at Rockford High, Makenzie placed donation bags and information about the need for clean water.  Weekly, Makenzie would go around to each classroom and pick up the donations, all the while wearing a cast on her knee.  Friends really mattered as they pitched in and helped with making the rounds to each classroom to collect the donations.

The donations made a big jump the day that Makenzie attended her parish’s youth organization, WHAM, and heard from a team that had just come back from Africa.  The team shared their first hand story of what they experienced during their trip, including seeing the need for clean water.  When they heard Makenzie was raising funds for a well project, the donations that were collected that night were passed to Makenzie for her fund raising efforts.

Cool enough already, right?

Enter Sam, a 4^th grader at Parkside Elementary School.  Sam’s teacher gave each student $2 and challenged them to change the world with it.  Sam’s Dad was reading a news article about a girl in his town that was raising funds for a well in Africa (yup, this was Makenzie), and Sam really liked the idea.  Sam wrote to Makenzie and told her he wanted to help. Sam and his family made up donation cans each with a message about clean water (like, “$1 will give 1 person water for 1 year!”) and placed them around Sam’s school.  Sam’s set a goal of $100 and he raised $104, exceeding his goal!

Globally, Makenzie and Sam are making a difference.

Locally, they were connecting with each other, sharing the goal, and encouraging each other.  In fact, Makenzie demonstrated that encouragement when she had a special Excellence award made up for Sam, and then surprised him at Parkside with the award, a certificate for a dozen cupcakes from her renowned cupcake side-business, and an I’M GIVING WATER wrist band from The Water Project.    Way to keep the spring encouragement going Makenzie!

When we asked Sam what he would want to say to a student his age in Africa who will drink from the well his fundraising helped build, Sam said, simply, “I would say that I was glad I could help you.”  You did Sam …

Check out Makenzie’s fundraising page at: http://thewaterproject.org/community/profile/kenzie-conner .   She is just short of her goal of $1500.  If you would like to help, we’re sure she and Sam would appreciate it!

“In August of 2009 after a lifetime of battling obesity, I had a moment of clarity that the time had come.  At 5’5” and 251 pounds I started a journey to change my life. At that time I was taking medications for high blood pressure, cholesterol, and gout.  In September of 2010, 13 months after I began my journey I had dropped 100 pounds and was free from all medications.  It was in September 2010 that I tried for the first time in my life to run a mile without stopping.  After running for 5 minutes on the treadmill I felt pretty good and was encouraged to keep going…15 minutes later I had run my first mile.  One month later I decided I needed closure to the process I started a year earlier; that closure would be signing up for a ½ marathon.

I had been considering ways to raise money for the Water Project before this time, but this goal of running 13.1 miles felt like the perfect opportunity to challenge those around me to donate.  I set a goal of $2,500 for myself and opened a donation page sending out a request to everyone I knew personally and at work that I thought would support my goal.  Within one week I was above $2,500 and raised my goal to $5,000.  Over a 12 week period from January through March I trained 5 days a week running over 200 miles during the process.  As the final weeks approached I topped $5,200 in donations.   The fact that so many had given so much kept me motivated; how could I not run one more mile for those in need.  On March 27, 2011 I completed the Oakland Half Marathon in 2:28 minutes without walking one single step and in the process changed the lives of many who will now have water to drink.”

Stephen, we applaud you and thank all the folks who supported you, both physically through training, emotionally through encouragement, and financially through donations.  Our thanks to Sephora for their matching gifts program that also made this well project at a Uganda school possible.  You all are an inspiration!

For the March concerts, the theme of water was chosen.  A selection of water-themed songs that included poetry from Masefield and Longfellow, a Zulu folksong, and a popular African spiritual were interspersed with narration by the choristers who shared facts about the clean water issues that plague developing countries. Included in the program, Ms. Boos spurred the concert attendees on, writing, “As we sing about the rush of a river, the power of the ocean, the tranquility of a still lake, and the rhythm of the rain, we hope that you will also consider how precious a resource water is, what we can all do to use it justly, and how we can ensure that every person has access to safe, clean water.”

The concert patrons certainly rose to the challenge as they generously donated $712 toward a well project.  Wondering what $712 would do, I was happy to report to Ms. Boos that this would come close to paying for the cost of a hand pump, or bring clean water to nearly 3 classrooms of children at a school.  The Northwest Girlchoir’s donation will be partnered with other donations to bring clean water to a community that will no doubt join the choir and sing a big thank you to the kind donors from the Northwestern United States!

You can support Winn’s Fundraiser here »

Michelle Gowan, Winn’s REACH teacher, shared with us, “This year, our curriculum focus has been infusing technology into our discussions of scarcity of food, energy and water around the world. When we studied the inequitable distribution of resources around the world, my class decided to purchase a goat to send to an African family. They collected about $130 by doing extra chores and we donated the goat through World Vision. When I began my lessons on water, I really had no intention of building a well because it was difficult enough for us to get enough to buy a goat!”  But Mrs. Gowan wasn’t counting on Winn!  He decided to do something.  The issues of unclean water resonated with him, and he started his own hometown revolution.

Winn came home from school one day and was counting to 15, only to start counting to 15 all over again.  As reported in the local newspaper, Winn’s Mom Tiffany asked what Winn was doing.  He promptly informed her that every 15 seconds a child dies from water borne illness.  (read the full article here.)  Winn gets it …the issues are real, and they matter to families all over the world.  Winn took the steps to setup a personal fundraising page for a well project.  And he brought the idea back to Mrs. Gowan.

“To be honest, I taught my lesson, checked it off of my lesson plan and prepared to move on….but the teacher can’t move on if the children won’t come with her! Winn came back to class with his water bracelets and we began to discuss how we might be able to contribute something even if it was not enough to build an entire well.”, says Mrs. Gowan.  They decided to carry water, and soon the whole school wanted to get involved.  Then other schools caught on and joined the movement.

The other schools will be donating to Winn’s fundraising page with the goal to raise enough for a well project.  And I hear that Winn was invited to speak to the school board, and is being asked by some of the other schools to come and speak to the students and raise awareness.   The community of Macon won’t be the same, and communities in Africa will be the better for it.

As Winn’s Mom Tiffany shared with us, “This has become an incredibly educational experience in so many ways and we are constantly amazed at the random acts of kindness committed by other people, often people we have never seen or even met. “  Further, she encourages us all with, “Maybe our story, Macon’s story, will inspire others to think globally and act locally in their own hometowns.”

We think Winn, his family, his class, and the community of Macon, are well on their way to doing just that!

As of World Water Day, March 22nd – we got word that Winn has raised over $6,500.  Enough for his first entire well!!

Olivia is a senior at Daniel High School and has been working on her Senior Project since early in the fall of 2010.  Olivia’s passion for Africa and knowledge of the need for clean, safe water inspired her to fundraise for water projects in communities in Sierra Leone.  To date, Olivia has raised nearly $12,000.

In her research to find an organization to work with, Olivia said, “I wanted to hear stories of struggle, hope, and redemption–of real people with thoughts and feelings and ambitions. I guess what I’m saying is that The Water Project showed me, in a tangible way, the people behind the numbers that I wanted to help.” And help she did.

“Under the guidance of my mentor, Dayle Stewart,” Olivia writes to us, “I started small, setting up what I call an “awareness booth” at a local spa where the patrons, if they chose, listened to my great big plans for a well that would serve an entire village.”

Olivia showed pictures, shared the facts about water, and even filled a water bottle with simulated dirty water to illustrate what folks have to drink in many of the locations where The Water Project works.

Next, Olivia collaborated with her Biology teacher and started to raise funds by selling ‘Biology Gone Wrong’ donation tickets; the cost of which went directly to the well fund. Olivia involved her classmates, and to encourage competition for the most sold, rewarded the highest group with a pizza party, generously donated by Papa John’s Pizza.

But, Olivia wasn’t done yet… she had more fund raisers ahead including letters to family and friends inviting them to donate to the project. Olivia worked to build an ever expanding community who would become a part of these water projects with her.

The latest event was a spaghetti dinner and silent auction.  Olivia canvassed her community inviting area businesses, family and friends to donate items that would be included in the silent auction. Olivia’s basement quickly began filling with donated items to auction off.  80 hungry and generous guests attended the spaghetti dinner.  It was a resounding success and raised over $8,500.

If that wasn’t enough, in the true sense of collaboration Olivia is further sharing her energy and inspiration. She recently partnered with another senior, Sinead Haughey, who is also working on a senior project.  Sinead will be hosting a 5K race on March 12^th called, ‘Go to the Well 5K’.  Proceeds from this race will add to the ever growing fundraising total.

Check out their progress at http://thewaterproject.org/community/profile/olivia-coury

Olivia’s final words of wisdom for all of us fellow fundraisers…, “I guess the best advice I can really give is to keep at it. It will take loads of time and effort, but it’s so worth it.”  “I have learned so much….God has taught me that when a little bit of our faith in Him intersects His endless faithfulness, God shows up BIG- two wells big! ”

Olivia, we couldn’t agree more!  Count us inspired!!