Brooklyn Students Send Supplies To Puerto Rican School

DOWNTOWN BROOKLYN, NY — A Spanish teacher at a Downtown Brooklyn charter school was devastated hearing about the destruction reeked by Hurricane Maria on Puerto Rico, which took down her mother's home on the island.

Isamar Rosado-Aponte felt lost being so far away from her former home, but her students at Brooklyn Prospect Downtown Elementary School helped her get through it.

"I felt kind of impotent that I wasn't able to be there in this moment," said Rosado-Aponte, who moved to New York nine years ago. "The students were the one who gave me that strength cause they kept going day by day. As soon as they heard about my situation they were looking forward to do something."

That impulse to help eventually turned into the Borinquen Backpack Project, during which the kids sent backpacks stuffed with school supplies to Puerto Rican students whose campus was destroyed in the storm and sent letters pleading the federal government for help.

"You can help though," 9-year-old student Maeva Hart wrote to President Donald Trump. "We have things they need. The U.S. should be sending supplies like food and things for school."

"It was very amazing to see how everyone was so united in our cause," said Rosado-Aponte. "It was a process for myself of healing through that moment."

The project started right after the storm tore through Puerto Rico in September when Rosado-Aponte and another co-worker found out the Luis M. Santiago Elementary school in Toa Baja had been destroyed.

Hurricane Maria caused a nearby river to flood and sent four-feet of water through the school, knocking in the roof and rendering the kindergarten-through-eighth-grade building uninhabitable for students.

Rosado-Aponte remembered having to flee her childhood home during hurricane season and her mother telling her to leave everything but school supplies. The Brooklyn Spanish teacher realized how important getting back to school would be for Luis M. Santiago students so she came up with the idea to fill backpacks with supplies.

"Their lives would not stop there," she said. "Education should continue as fast as possible."

The kindergarten-through-fourth-grade students at Brooklyn Prospect Downtown Elementary and their parents eventually raised about $6,000 to buy 400 backpacks — enough for the entire student body at Luis M. Santiago — filled with erasers, sharpeners, books, pencils, markers, crayons, colored pencils, flash cards and a toy each. They also bought teacher materials, cleaning supplies and personal care products for the students.

They started sending the supplies to the island in November and were able to send over 21 different packages of goods to the school, which eventually continued classes this year.

Rosado-Aponte also dedicated some of her Spanish class going over the history of Puerto Rico, the devastation of the storm and the aftermath of trying to get aid.

Once the last shipment made its way to Puerto Rico, Rosado-Aponte thought that was the end of the project. However, the students had other ideas.

They pushed the school to try and help out more, eventually starting a Puerto Rico committee with delegates from a student in each classroom. The committee FaceTimed with the students at Luis M. Santiago to learn about the recovery struggles and decided to start a letter-writing campaign asking elected officials for help.

"I think its pretty amazing, [the students] don't forget what happened," said Rosado-Aponte.

Last week, the students sent over a batch of letters to Trump, Mayor Bill de Blasio and other elected officials across the country asking for more aid for Puerto Rico.

With the school year ended, Rosado-Aponte hopes to continue the Borinquen Backpack Project next year and maybe employ similar efforts for victims of other natural disasters around the world.

But if not, the project had a big impact on students from Luis M. Santiago who got some much-needed support from students more than a thousand miles away.

"Seeing that there were people in New York thinking about this, they were very excited," said Rosado-Aponte. "We felt alone at one point, we don't feel alone anymore."

Images courtesy of Brooklyn Prospect Downtown Elementary School