EASTHAMPTON — As much of Haiti’s water supply is tainted with cholera, three Pioneer Valley elementary schools have started a fundraiser to help the cause.
Students from Maple Elementary School, Jackson Street School and Smith College Campus School will raise money for Aquatabs, which are drinking water purification tablets.
Maple School first-grade teacher Margaret Betts is leading the local effort.
“How many times do you use water a day?” Betts asked students at a school meeting Tuesday.
Chatter filled the cafeteria as children counted.
“What if you had to carry your water to get it — every drop of water you needed?” Betts said. “It didn’t come from a pipe — someone in your family had to go and get that water, maybe for miles and carry it back.”
And what if the water makes you sick, she said.
Yvette Depestre, originally from Haiti, spoke to students about Maro Verger, a small community in rural Haiti that endured Hurricane Matthew last fall and an earthquake in 2010 that demolished the school building.
She runs the charity Marco Depestre Foundation of Ottawa, in Canada. She travels to Haiti once a year to help children in Maro Verger. Her organization helped rebuild the Maro Verger school building after the 2010 earthquake as well as construct a cistern for potable water.
Depestre showed photos from Maro Verger of the school and students, talking about what an average school day is like.
Haitian children attending school at Maro Verger must carry buckets of water from a cistern to the school up the mountain. And while the cistern has a filter to clean the water, Depestre said, when at home, many students are at risk of drinking water tainted with cholera.
“One pill for one gallon and that’s what makes the water safe to drink,” Depestre told the students at Maple. “But most of the children in that area do not have Aquatabs.”
When bought in bulk, the Aquatabs cost about 2 cents.
“A single Aquatab cleans a gallon of water,” Betts told the students. “For every $7.30, that’s a gallon a day for a whole year for someone.”
Betts said the message for her students is how much difference 2 cents can make in the life of someone who lacks clean water.
She suggested students look for spare change around the house and under couch cushions as well as starting a lemonade stand when the weather warms up.
The fundraiser will be completed at the end of May. Betts said Easthampton Savings Bank has offered to tally the money.
Caitlin Ashworth can be reached at cashworth@gazettenet.com.