By Brian Zanzonico
In recent weeks, students at all five schools have waged a unified campaign to raise awareness of an atrocity taking place on the other side of the globe.
On June 10, they will gather at Sewanhaka High School in Floral Park and walk more than three miles to Elmont Memorial High School to draw attention to a human crisis: the genocide in Darfur, Sudan. Participants are hoping their cries for help will resonate loudly with fellow students, residents and politicians.
"We're not politicians, we're diplomats," said Marc Isseks, chairman of H. Frank Carey High School's social studies department. "But we have a moral conscience that says genocide is wrong. It's not a U.S. problem. It's not a British problem. It's not an African Union problem. It's a human problem."
In Darfur, government-sponsored genocide began killing off non-Arab, mostly black Sudanese in 2003. The Sudanese government is using Arab janjaweed militias to destroy crops, poison water and prevent humanitarian aid from reaching the region. Girls as young as middle-school age are routinely raped, and young boys are forced to take up arms. Though this is in clear violation of the 1949 Geneva Convention banning government attacks on civilians, there has been no end to the daily massacres.
After visiting Suffolk Community College for a lecture on Darfur by Suffolk County Congressman Steve Israel a few months ago, Carey students established the Darfur Awareness Committee. An unofficial group with no school funding, the committee has met every Wednesday before school over the last few months to discuss ways to alert the uninformed to the horrors of Sudan.
Meetings were initially attended by only a handful of students. But, Isseks said, the number has grown to more than 30, as more students are looking to see what they can do to help people who are unable to help themselves.
"You can't have a good time with this on your conscience," said Carey sophomore Tom Samoia. "It's sick. How can you shoot a 1-year-old girl and not think twice about it? It makes me want to do something."
One of the measures the schools plan to take is to raise money for the Save Darfur Coalition, an organization comprising more than 100 human rights groups working to raise global awareness of the situation. Students will sell green bracelets that say "Not on our watch" and T-shirts that read "Darfur" on the front and "Just Google search it" on the back. Isseks received permission from the search engine's executives to use the Google name.
To drum up support for the walk and spread awareness at Elmont Memorial High School, seniors and members of the Model U.N. and Key Club will be giving five- to 10-minute presentations in classrooms for all grades throughout the school. On June 7 there will be an after-school screening of the film "Hotel Rwanda" - about a hotel manager who took in hundreds of Tutsis during their escape from Hutu militia in Rwanda -with faculty collecting donations after the show. On June 9, it's Wear Green for Darfur Day.
"We're just saying the world should be aware, and every country should work with the U.N. to put an end to this," said Elmont social studies department Chairman Dr. Baytoram Ramharack, who is also the district's social studies coordinator.
In the most recent development in Darfur, Sudan's government has not decided whether it will allow U.N. peacekeeping troops into the region. It has agreed, however, to let a U.N. technical team in to investigate the U.N.'s role. The U.N. Security Council hopes to deploy tens of thousands of peacekeepers to relieve undermanned African Union troops overseeing a cease-fire. Carey student Phil Kistler said that despite the U.N.'s pressure, he won't be happy until "boots are on the ground" in Darfur to aid victims of the ethnic cleansing.
"I say it not as a citizen of the United States," Kistler, a SUNY-Brockport-bound senior said, "but as a citizen of the world."
Sewanhaka social studies chairman Matthew Schwartz said that the event, sandwiched the weekend between the SATs and Regents exams, coincides with Regents review and athletic physicals at Sewanhaka. He said he hopes those students join their classmates for a program at the walk's end point, Elmont High School. Schwartz and Isseks said they are working on getting a guest speaker who survived Darfur, possibly one of Sudan's "Lost Boys," young men who were orphaned and escaped slaughter when Islamic fundamentalists from northern Sudan attacked southern villages.
"It's a genocide," Schwartz said. "It's an important current event and not something to be ignored."
Ramharack said the goal of the awareness walk is to involve not only the district's student body, but also residents of the district's four communities, Elmont, Franklin Square, Floral Park and New Hyde Park. It will take place the morning of the 138th Belmont Stakes, and Isseks hopes residents who see the march will join in before heading to Belmont Park. Isseks said he received permits for the march from the Town of Hempstead and requested that the route start at Covert Avenue and continue to Meacham Avenue, Dutch Broadway and Ridge Road, the home of Elmont High School. He wanted to avoid Hempstead Turnpike, to prevent a traffic snarl created by horse racing fans heading to the track early.
Carey sophomore Brittany Zezima said she is proud to be a part of a group of teens who are tuning into a global crisis rather than turning on their iPods and tuning out the world. "Our generation has become enthralled by 'American Idol,' the Internet," she said. "It's great to have a group stand up and say we still understand there are people less fortunate, and we want to help."
Isseks said the efforts of district students goes a long way in dispelling high schoolers' reputations as being cloistered and out of touch. "It speaks volumes about the students of the district, to make individual sacrifices at a time when teens get a bad rap for being selfish and self-centered," he said.
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