Hurricane Ida hit Upper Dublin Township especially hard. Due to a tornado that cut directly through the township, Upper Dublin High School and Ft. Washington Elementary suffered significant damage. 12 year old Maya Rosenzweig, a 7th grade student at Jenkintown Middle/High School, wanted to help; last week, due to her hard work, networking skills, and the kindness of the Jenkintown community, she was able to.

Maya’s father is originally from the Upper Dublin area and Maya’s oldest friend, Sloane, lives there now. When Maya and her father volunteered to help with some of the clean up, Maya became inspired to help those in the area as they began the arduous process of rebuilding.

Knowing that those at FWES needed all the help they could get, Maya began collecting school supplies and money donations to help the teachers of FWES restock their classrooms. She reached out to Jenkintown Middle/High School Principal Thomas Roller and Elementary Principal Jason Benfield with a request to distribute a flyer about her project to Jenkintown school families and both obliged. Maya’s collection also made its rounds on social media and caught fire in the Jenkintown community. By the end of the fundraiser, Maya was able to collect over $2000.00 and a huge pile of school supplies. Last week, Maya delivered those supplies to the FWES teachers in the form of 28 gift bags along with a $75 Amazon gift card attached to each.

Maya gauged the success of her fundraiser by the countless e-mails she received from grateful FWES teachers after she delivered the donations. At a time when all seems lost, people like Maya Rosenzweig show us that benevolence and empathy can exist at any age.

Photo courtesy of Andrew Rosenzweig