Social work majors Sara Chaney, Chelsea Derbyshire and Briarston Ashford raised money to help underprivileged students.
The three said they were inspired to act when Dr. Stephen Baldridge’s assigned his macro social work class a project requiring students to find a large population, conduct a needs assessment and implement an intervention.
With these requirements in mind, the trio decided to donate uniforms for students at Craig Middle School.
“We hope to all eventually work with middle school-aged kids someday, whether that’s school, social work or with an organization that focuses on that population,” Chaney said.
The group’s goal increased to $800, an amount that was met the first week of the fundraiser. As of Thursday, $1,715 was raised. On Facebook, the fundraiser received 45 shares.
“We started off at $600, and then we met that within a week and were really surprised,” Chaney said.
The women have never done a project like this before, but Chaney said they’ve been pleased with their results so far.
“Honestly after we met our goal, we just want as much money as possible, because that means more uniforms,” Chaney said.
The group originally set out to sponsor individual students, but after raising so much money, thought it was better to donate a closet of uniforms to the school. With what they’ve raised so far, they should be able to purchase around 75 uniforms.
“We’re just going to build a closet, which is run by one of the faculty members,” Chaney said. “It’s about $20 for one uniform set.”
Chaney said she hopes ACU students will contribute to the group’s effort.
“It doesn’t have to be an extravagant amount – we’ll take any help we receive.”