Fifth-grader’s multitasking kicks in for fund-raiser

Savannah Hill insists that it was no sacrifice for her to give up more than a week of recess time. Once her teacher suggested a fund-raiser for victims of Hurricane Katrina, the Ponderosa Elementary School fifth-grader spent her free time in and out of school to ensure that the project would be a success.

Karlicia Berry coordinates the gifted and talented program in the Post Falls school District and was the one to approach Savannah’s class with the fund-raiser idea. She was impressed how her 10-year-old student took charge.

“I never had to do a thing,” Berry said. “She took the ball right out of my hand and ran with it.”

Savannah and her friend, Bailey Rhoton, teamed to organize the event. The plan was to set out empty plastic water jugs at the school open house and create stations for donations. The two girls took the jugs around to each classroom and enlisted the help of other children. Savannah took charge of drawing up the floor plan for the donation stations and figured where the most traffic would be. She devised a signup sheet so students could man the stations and grouped together children that she knew were friends as work partners.

“She is amazing in her leadership,” Berry said. “She has a wonderful way of doing this, and people respond to her. She gets very focused on the goal, but also is very conscious of people’s feelings.”

The reason Savannah gives for taking on the project is simple.

“I thought I could help out,” she said.

She went door-to-door one Sunday asking neighbors if they would like to donate. Accompanying her were pictures she found on the Internet showing the damage that was done by the storm.

“We didn’t print the really bad pictures,” she said. “We tried not to show people suffering.”

But trees atop cars and the birds-eye view of flooding from a helicopter were effective in persuading her neighbors to donate $150. One neighbor turned over the family’s own collection jug of spare change.

The night of the open house, Savannah floated between stations to see that everything was running smoothly. After the event, she looked at the pile of change. There was currency she’d never seen before, Canadian coins and odd-looking pennies. She called in her friends to help count and separate it all.

“I learned that you can’t do it yourself; you need other people, too,” Savannah said.

The water jug donations came to about $700, and Best Buy in Coeur d’Alene agreed to match the donations dollar for dollar. Funds will go to the American Red Cross.

Savannah’s mother, Sallie, was not surprised by her daughter’s efforts. She’s seen similar determination when visitors with young children arrive at their house. Savannah turns the basement into carnival booths to keep the kids occupied.

“I like multitasking,” Savannah said.

Although she’s not quite old enough for baby sitting, Savannah is already planning a baby-sitting club and has asked for a ledger book to keep track of the dues.

“Her mind is going all the time,” Sallie said. “She gets involved in quite a few things.”

That includes her recent acceptance into the Coeur d’Alene Junior Symphony, where she plays cello. She also takes piano lessons, and is a member of the school choir and a volleyball team. Savannah moved from Nine Mile Falls two years ago with her mother, father, Kirk, and two brothers, Connor and Lincoln. She likes it here better because she has lots more girlfriends here, she said. Her last neighborhood was full of boys.

While some may consider fund-raising to be a difficult task, Savannah swears that the preparations were no trouble.

“I like organizing things,” she said. “It wasn’t really work for me because I thought it was really fun. It was way more fun than recess.”