USA School Children Join Together in Life-Saving Partnership  

For immediate release

November 10, 2008  

Contact: Anne Ginther, President of RandomKid: anne @ randomkid.org

Who: Students from schools across the USA, and their hero, Trevor Field, who developed a life-saving water pump that the children have chosen to fund.

What: Six schools across the USA are putting their education into action, creating businesses to fund technologies that provide clean, safe water in parts of the world that need it. Enterprising students will learn in a videoconference that they've met their goal to fund a water pump serving roughly 5000 people in rural South Africa, who will for the first time have access to safe, clean drinking water. Also on the call will be the South African developer of the water pump the kids funded, Trevor Field.

Note: Video, journals, and photos of all participants doing their work can be made available at request, along with video of South African school children who have already received a life saving pump from some of these kids.

When: Monday, November 10, 8:30 PST, 10:30 CST, 11:30 EST

Location: Multiple points around the USA, and in South Africa:

Green Valley Elementary School in Sinking Spring, PA

Public School 98 in Douglaston, NY

The Academy in Des Moines, IA

Lincoln Park High School in Chicago, IL

Portola Elementary in San Bruno, CA

RoundAbout Outdoor in Johannesburg, South Africa

Nov 5th, 2008--School children from diverse backgrounds across the USA put their education into action and joined together in their efforts to save lives. These children developed their own bottled water businesses to fund water-pumping technologies that bring safe clean drinking water to the world. On Monday, November 10th, they'll participate in a videoconference with each other, and the man who developed the pump they are funding. On that call, both the students and the developer of the pump will learn that funding has been completed.

These school-aged entrepreneurs have created a partnership with schools around the USA to help the UN achieve one of its Millennium Development Goals--to reduce by half the proportion of people without sustainable access to safe drinking water by 2015. Currently 1 billion people do not have access to safe, clean water, leading to the deaths of 1.5 million children under the age of 5 annually.

The nonprofit organization that brings these kids together is called RandomKid. Led by a 13-year-old CEO, RandomKid helps any random kid solve real world problems. RandomKid educates, mobilizes, unifies and empowers youth of all backgrounds and abilities to make a tangible, measurable difference in the world, matching their passion with direct impact projects that they choose. By pooling their resources together, kids can actualize their goals for others.

The students began their project by learning about the scope of the world’s water crisis, and researching pumping technologies; where help is needed, what kind of help is needed, and the associated costs. Having already funded one pump, Children from California and Iowa reached out to invite schools across America to join them in doing more. Kids in New York who read about it as part of their school curriculum insisted on joining the effort. Teachers in Pennsylvania were looking for a way to put their education into action, and found themselves developing the entire 6th grade curriculum around this program. And children in Chicago were so moved by the idea that they could make a measurable difference in the world, that they too, answered the call.

RandomKid helped the schools to set up their bottled water ventures, guiding them through the development of brand names, strategic marketing plans, and kid-designed labels. Third graders from New York named their water, “ Sip and Save a Life”, and the sixth graders from Pennsylvania named their water, “ H2O: Help 2 Others ”.

These children hope to see their project spread to even more schools across the U.S.A., opening the “floodgates” of hope for some of the estimated 1 billion people around the world do not have access to clean, safe water. For more information, or to join us in this project, please go to www.randomKid.org/water.asp or visit our "water blog" (www.easethirst.blogspot.com) to read journal entries by those involved in this project.

About RandomKid (www.randomkid.org )

RandomKid is a 501C3 nonprofit that helps any random kid solve real world problems. Co-founded by 13- year-old Talia Leman and her adult partner Anne Ginther in 2005 after uniting kids across the USA to report over 10 million for hurricane Katrina/Rita relief, Randomkid now works to educate, mobilize and empower youth to meaningfully impact a broad spectrum of local, national and global needs.

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Media Contact

Anne Ginther, President
RandomKid

Tel  612.210.9952 mobile
Email  Anne@RandomKid.org