My Girl Scout Gold Award project focuses on creating a sustainable clean water and hygiene education initiative for students in Ethiopia in partnership with Project HEAL Ethiopia. Through community-led money-earning activities such as bake sales, yard sales, and donation outreach, I plan to raise funds to purchase water filters for schools with limited access to clean drinking water.

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Empowering Ethiopian Schools Through Clean Water and Hygiene Education

Help bring clean water to the small communities and Operation Smile patients in the Philippines!

Earthquake Relief in the Philippines!

The Global Health and Education Leadership Club at NC State is a student organization focused on fundraising, education, and advocacy for Operation Smile and BlinkNow. Operation Smile is an international nonprofit that provides free, safe surgical care for children and adults with cleft conditions while empowering local medical professionals and students through training and service. BlinkNow Foundation is a nonprofit organization that supports children and families in Surkhet, Nepal by providing education, a safe home, and community development programs that promote long-term well-being. Within BlinkNow is the Kopila Valley School providing free, high-quality education to over 400 students from preschool-grade 12. 

Our goal is to raise funds for 25 water filters from Waves for Water to deliver directly to the Operation Smile Club at Kopila Valley School in Nepal this July. We will hold a fun run 5K Run/Walk fundraising event where students and faculty will purchase tickets by donating to our courier page. 

On April 26, 2026, our club will host a 5K run/walk event at NC State to raise funds for these filters. Students, faculty, staff, and community members will purchase tickets to participate, and all proceeds will go directly toward purchasing the 25 filters from Waves for Water.

One of our members will volunteer at Kopila Valley School through the BlinkNow Foundation. Within the school, there is a student-led Operation Smile Club that is passionate about service and community outreach. Our goal is to equip these students with portable water filters so they can expand their impact beyond the school and into surrounding communities.

This summer, the filters will be hand-delivered to Kopila Valley School in Nepal. They will be entrusted to the student-led Operation Smile Club, whose members will distribute the filters to families in need and teach their communities about the importance of clean water and sanitation.

Kopila Valley School has a large presence of student leaders who are already committed to serving their communities. By placing the filters directly in the hands of motivated students, we support a model of local leadership and sustainable change.

Through this courier project, we hope to create a ripple effect by empowering students in Nepal to become advocates for health while ensuring families have access to safe, clean drinking water!

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 GHELC at NC State Waves For Water 5K

We are excited to be joining a team who are providing care to remote communities who live in remote villages along the Amazon banks. We're taking a break from high school to travel by boat 100 miles up river from Manaus, the Jungle City. 

Why? We know there's always lots to do to support the team in this kind of mission. We're training to learn how to dispense reading glasses. Bringing water filters is bringing millions of gallons of clean water and its so easy to bring in our luggage. Drinkable water is something we take for granted back home. 

Thank you for helping us,
Rosie and Mia

Brazilian Amazon Medical and Dental Outreach Clinics

Brazilian Amazon medical and dental outreach clinics.

Water is not healthy in Ethiopia. I have made four trips there bringing various water filter and treatment options. They need more

Water filters for Ethiopia

Coming from Germany, I’ve dreamed of going to Mozambique for quite some time now — drawn by the ocean, the surfing, and the chance to do something meaningful. After reading Castillo et al. (2025), I realized how deeply access to clean water shapes children’s growth and futures, and how unequal that access still is. Today, around 40% of people in Mozambique do not have reliable access to safe drinking water, and I want to be part of changing that — combining my love for the sea with a commitment to making clean water accessible to all.

Improve Water Access in Mozambique: 

The Irie surf program was a surf therapy initiative aimed to take place in Jamaica in November 2025. Considering the impact hurricane Melissa had on the island, we'd like to adapt our actions to the needs on the ground by providing clean water access to community in needs in St Andrew Parish, where the Jamnesia Surf Camp is located.

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Irie surf program joins hurricane relief efforts 

On October 28, 2025, Category 5 Hurricane Melissa devastated the island nation of Jamaica, leaving an estimated 90% of the island’s infrastructure destroyed. The electrical grid and water systems have been rendered inoperable for an unknown duration, and access to safe drinking water is critically limited.

In response, we are delivering 300 compact, effective, and easy-to-use water filters to communities in need. Each filter can produce up to 1,000,000 gallons (3,785,410 liters) of clean water over its lifespan—enough to sustain 100 people for up to five years.

Your support empowers these surfers’ mission to bring relief where it’s needed most. Together, we can turn compassion into action and help restore life—one clean sip at a time.

Clean water for Jamaica

To pass water filters to communities through remote areas of Mongolia and Ulaanbaantar. 

Mongolia - Safe Water Access

Water filter for people in Chiquimula, Guatemala

CLEAN WATER FOR CHIQUIMULA, GUATEMALA (PROSSERNAZ)

Funding for this project will go towards women's agricultural cooperatives in Nicaragua. Through a partnership with LA Fem (Fundación Entre Mujeres)  these water filters will go toward rural communities in region of Esteli Nicaragua and the Coastal region of Leon Nicaragua. 

LA FEM provides, land, seeds, tools, education, legal services, health resources and various tools to empower women in rural communities in entrepreneurship. They achieve this through granting women these resources to grow organic coffee, utilizing agroecological and other sustainable farming practices. Through partnership they enable the women market access with fair trade organization in the US and Europe to sell the coffee they grow at above-market rates. 

When a women or group of women are productive enough, they pass on these same resources on to keep to ensure the model continues to be self-sustaining. Through this arm of the program alone, LA FEM has empowered thousands of women create income and livelihoods for their families and communities. 

Even so, clean water is something that is still difficult to access for many communities. When it rains the streams, rivers and water resources often become contaminated often severely effecting children. Millions of children die evert year in communities like these through preventable illnesses like pneumonia and diarrhea. 

Couriers

Empowering Ethiopian Schools Through Clean Water ...