Photo by Dennis Gvillo Seventh- and eight-graders at Our Lady Queen of Peace School in Bethalto load a truck with donations bound for Rosenwald Elementary School in New Roads, La., an area devastated by flooding in Hurricane Gustav. An appeal for help from Andy Sears, a ’99 OLQP grad who teaches third grade in the Teach for America program at the school, sparked the donation drive.

BETHALTO - Having grown up in Bethalto not far from Alton and the Mississippi River, Andy Sears knew something about flooding. But nothing really prepared the 23-year-old, just starting his teaching career in the Teach for America program at a Louisiana school in a low income area, for the devastation and suffering after Hurricane Gustav tore through the area.

Sears moved to New Roads, La., two months ago to teach third grade at Rosenwald Elementary School, a school with five times the enrollment of Our Lady Queen of Peace School in Bethalto, where he attended grade school.

When the hurricane hit New Roads, the grade school flooded as did much of the town. Hundreds of homes were damaged, and many of the low income homes destroyed. Sears was shocked by the degree of devastation and pain he saw. He called his parents in Bethalto, describing the situation to them and they in turn told people at their parish and other friends in the Bethalto community.

Sears e-mailed Rosemary Dorsey, his OLQP eighth-grade teacher, appealing for help. "My students have very little, and the hurricane literally took what little they had and completely demolished it," Andy wrote. "We are in desperate need of just the basic necessities. We need underwear, shoes, socks, shirts and other clothing items."

Students at Rosenwald wear uniforms similar to those worn by students at OLQP. The uniforms, like most of their other clothes, were lost in the flooding.

They also needed toothpaste, toothbrushes, deodorant, soap, toilet paper, cleaning supplies, school supplies and more.

"I know this list is a lot, but they lost everything," Sears wrote his former teacher.

Dorsey told her seventh- and eighth-grade students what Andy had written and they created a campaign, calling it "Andy's Kids."

News about the campaign went out in the parents newsletter, along with a copy of Andy's e-mail. Father Tom Liebler, OLQP pastor, made an announcement about the campaign at church, and a notice ran in the church bulletin. Word spread quickly throughout the Bethalto and Metro-East business community.

The campaign took off immediately, and in one week's time, donated items filled up an entire classroom, plus they received $26,000 in cash donations. Half the cash was used to purchase complete new uniforms for 550 students.

"The Sears store in Alton donated clothing from its own store, then went to all the Sears stores in the St. Louis area and collected more donations," Eve Remiszewski, OLQP principal said. "Parishioners, parents, Metro-East business community and neighboring public school even donated things. A little boy came into school one day with a bag of playground balls. ‘We have playground balls, I think they should too,' he told me.

"We've done a lot of service projects at Our Lady Queen of Peace, but I've never seen them take off like this, where it is one of our own who appealed for help."

Even the eighth-graders at OLQP are too young to remember Andy from his student days at OLQP. "But the Sears family is well known in the parish community," she said. Andy's dad, Joe, is the school's athletic director, his mother, Kathy, is director of the before- and after-school program at OLQP.

During the campaign week, seventh- and eighth-graders spent study halls sorting, packing and labeling items. Teachers and students stayed late Thursday night, Sept. 11, to help pack and label boxes to be put in the 40-foot truck of parishioner Tom Declue, who volunteered to drive the donations to Louisiana with the help of Jim England.

After the children's Mass the next morning, students gathered outside on the playground where Father Liebler blessed the drivers and the truck, as students extended their arms in prayer, and sang a blessing song.

 Later that morning the eighth-grade religion class shared their thoughts about the campaign..

"Just knowing how little those students had, it was really cool to have all that there and knowing we did that," Lyssa Mathews said.

"It was good to see how many people followed our example and brought in so many things," Alexis Silkwood said.

"It was really a great feeling that we gave something to a school that is five times bigger in size than ours," said Andrew Bond.

Barbara Collins, their religion teacher, said, "Giving to the children in Louisiana made a difference in their lives, and helping them made a difference in our lives."

The Advocate newspaper in Baton Rouge covered the arrival on the donations in New Roads, with reporter Mark H. Hunter quoting Rosenwald Principal Karla Jack's reaction.

"This is just overwhelming," Jack said. "For people to do this for us - and not know us - it's a miracle. The kids we have here are already impoverished and this will be a tremendous boost to our system. There are still good people in the world."