One Dollar For Life (ODFL) is collecting LEGOS and DUPLOS for its LEGOS for Life fundraiser from April 1 to June 1. The club is holding fundraisers throughout the Bay Area and plans to bring the donations to schools in Nicaragua and possibly Haiti.

The goal for this drive is to collect 2000 pounds of LEGOS and DUPLOS. Egan, LAHS and Synapse, a private school in Menlo Park, are participating in the fundraiser. Club members are also working to involve Mountain View High School (MVHS) and Blach Junior High School in the fundraising program.

This is the first time ODFL has asked Egan to help with one of its fundraisers. ODFL member sophomore Elizabeth Bishop and Egan history teacher Julia Clawson are working together to coordinate donations at the middle school. At LAHS, ODFL has set up donation bins in ODFL director Robert Freeman’s classroom, room 313.

“As the LEGOS come in, we are going to construct a tower … and we hope that this structure will reach the roof of Mr. Freeman’s classroom,” Elizabeth said.

To get the student body interested in the fundraiser, club members are going to take pictures of the tower as it is built and create a time-lapse video to show the fundraiser’s progress. They hope this will spark students’ interest for their cause and will encourage them to get actively involved.

“If we get enough, we’ll move [the tower] into the cafeteria. And if we get enough after that we’ll move it into the gym,” Freeman said. “I would like to see us building a three-story tower of DUPLOS and LEGOS.”

In addition to showing the video to students, the club plans to upload it to the Internet with the hope that it goes viral. This may encourage other schools arcoss the country to hold their own LEGOS for Life fundraiser.

If the club exceeds the target amount of 2000 pounds, the surplus will be brought to other children in ODFL-sponsored schools in the Yucatan, Kenya and Indonesia. The schools in Haiti and Nicaragua were prioritized over these countries as the primary recipients of the donations because of the connections ODFL members have with the local communities there.

Last year, ODFL volunteers traveled to Monte Grande in San Ramon, Nicaragua. In addition to constructing an ODFL-sponsored school there, volunteers brought along materials for the local children to play with. Even with these donations, there were still very few toys.

“We had taken down coloring books, but coloring books are consumed the first time you use them,” Freeman said. “We wanted something that was durable in the moisture, was good for hand-eye coordination, which is good for brain development and lasts forever.”

After returning from the trip to Nicaragua, Elizabeth came up with the idea for the LEGOS for Life fundraiser. She contacted local schools and, as a graduate from Egan, asked the middle school if the students wanted to partcipate.
“It’s the basic ethic of ODFL: everyone does the smallest bit, even if it is only one DUPLO or one LEGO,” Freeman said.“What [the video] does is it visualizes this idea of what’s possible if everybody does a small bit.”