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A 14-year-old is looking to change lives with an ambitious school project.
KGW says 9th grader Katelyn Povolny, who goes to school in the Beaverton School District, has raised thousands of dollars for her goal of building a library in Gulu, Uganda. She came up with the idea as an 8th-grade school project.
"I was looking on a website that has a bunch of nonprofits and I saw Elephante Commons," Katelyn told reporters. Elephante Commons is a nonprofit that helps the people of Gulu recover from years of war. The young girl emailed the executive director of the organization Brittany Neely, who is a former Portlander that moved to Gulu.
"We're focusing on working with community members to do what they want to do for the community. So they come to us with the idea, and we help make it happen," Neely says. "This is a community where kids will walk miles every day just to get access to books and sit and read." After the two connected, Katelyn got to work fundraising for the project.
Her original goal was $5,000. She ended up with nearly $19,000, reporters say.
But Katelyn's work isn't done yet. The Westview High School student is gathering books for the upcoming library and is selling shirts to keep raising money for Elephante Commons.
Neely says they expect to break ground in November or December. As for the children who will benefit from the library, they sent a video to Katelyn thanking her for her efforts.
“She is going to change the world,” Neely said of the young girl.
Click here to track the progress on the Gulu library.