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SOUTH BRUNSWICK: VIKING VIBE

Club makes crafts for charity

Sophomore Malaika Jawed, Viking Vibe Staff
Crafts for Charity, a new club to the high school this year, promotes charity among students while practicing marketing strategies and having fun as well.
Students in the club are given opportunities to give back to the community by creating do-it-yourself (DIY) crafts and selling them to collect money that will be donated to charities.
Together juniors Urmi Jain and Alina Peng decided to organize a school arts and crafts club that is based on donating sales profits to charities.
"We were both ‘artsy’ and there was no official arts or crafts club in the school, just an underground art club," Alina said. "We also liked the idea of helping charities and we were open to helping others."
With those goals in mind, the girls came up with the idea of ‘Crafts for Charity’.
The new club was welcomed by South Brunswick High School and currently has two presidents, Urmi and Alina, along with art teacher Twila O’Connell serving as the club advisor.
"This Charity Crafts Club could potentially become an active club for years to come. In the meantime members will spend quality fun time together and give to charity," Ms. O’Connell said. "We’ve raised enough money for a couple of Stop&Shop Gift cards that will go to local families during the holiday season. We have had two meetings and the membership attendance was between 25-30 students."
Although more positions may be added to the club’s Board of Directors next year, the currently unfilled positions of sales coordinator, attendance coordinator and treasurer are open to any students who plan to be club members. The presidents requested that interested students to contact them, or Ms. O’Connell.
Some other positions available in the club board include vice president and historian.
The club’s main objective, as mentioned on the high school website, is to help students give back to the community in a creative way.
Junior Rumkan Caur thought that the first meeting was "really fun and cute" and that she thinks that the club is club is going to be different than other clubs. "I think it’s going to be a stress relief place for me, just sitting there making little crafts."
Club meetings usually take place every other Tuesday, however this information is subject to potential change due to certain circumstances, including early releases or days off.
Alina said that the club is completely "member-oriented and it would be great to hear other people’s ideas for club activities."
In the first meeting on Oct. 14, the attendees created a Halloween-themed project: spider lollipops.
"We got blow pops, pipe cleaners to make spider legs, put them together and then glued on some eyes, and made this really cute spider," Alina said. "Everyone loves candy and it’s almost Halloween so it seemed like a good idea, and we made quite a few."
Ms. O’Connell said the spiders were inexpensive, readily available, and fit for the Halloween theme.
Junior Angali Agarwala thought that the club itself was a great idea, and was very unique too.
She said that the club financially developed up till now with a money contribution from her, Jain, and Ms. O’Connell.
The supplies were inexpensive as compared to other possibilities, so the presidents chose this project as the first one, hoping to gain enough earnings from the sale to fund a bigger craft assignment for the next meeting.
Although a certain amount of the profits for selling these crafts will contribute in buying the supplies for the next project, most of the proceeds will be donated to a charity. The charity, or possible charities, are currently undecided, and will be chosen according to member votes.
As the year progresses, Alina predicted greater profits, therefore resulting in more expensive supplies to create bigger projects like shirts or jewelry.
The items made in club are sold by club members who volunteer, and can also be purchased from Ms. O’Connell.
The volunteers receive service hours for helping out aside from club time. This is because most of the sales occur on days when there is no meeting.