Over spring break, 26 Inderkum High School students put on gloves, assembled boxes and made a difference in their Natomas community.

Project Mercy is a donation drive run by Inderkum’s Business Honor Society. Its first-ever event was held Mar. 29-31 at the North Natomas Regional Park. 

“We were seeking clothes and shoes or toys, the things that make us all human,” said sophomore organizer Tania Khan. “The things that don’t often get counted as necessity, but they often tend to be a great want and need for our locals.”

The proceeds of the event went to First Step Community and Union Gospel, according to Khan.

Junior Alina Jaquez Esqueda, head of the Project Mercy Marketing team, said it was difficult to get the word out about because of the limitations of being in high school.

 “When you’re a high school club, you don’t really know that many adults, especially since the adults are the ones who are mainly going to start donating,” said Jaquez Esqueda. “ I reached out to my whole entire community and my church as well, just to have the adults spread it because I feel like that was the most helpful thing . . .  making the flyers, printing the flyers, putting them on Instagram, trying to get all these people to know what’s going on in their communities. That was really hard.”

That hard work paid off during the three-day event.

Volunteer Ariana Cramsey, an Inderkum sophomore, said, “I love helping out . . . and just to give back to my community that I love, I donated like two bags of stuff, a lot of shoes, a lot of sports shoes.”

Sophomore volunteer Clayton Garcia-Meneses said he enjoyed his experience working for Project Mercy.

“I feel for the cause, you know, it’s to help those who are less fortunate,” said Meneses. “I didn’t grow up that fortunate myself and I know I would love some toys. The whole thing is great.”

Some volunteers also donated to the drive.

“I thought it was a good and convenient way to volunteer and give back to the community,” sophomore volunteer Joven Sandhu said, “because I know I have a lot of extra clothes that you need to donate and I thought this was the perfect opportunity,”.

The Project Mercy team also accepted monetary donations to make care packages. “We were able to raise $1,100 for Project Mercy alongside all of the clothing and toys,” Khan said.

“Project Mercy is something that has really a greater meaning for each of us besides the fact that it’s something for our community,” Khan said. “I think each of us are really putting our heart and soul into it . . . I would love for this to be an annual thing that we do or perhaps even on a bi-monthly basis if that’s possible.”