FULLERTON — Miaad Bushala initially was a little peeved when her mom suggested she raise money for charity for her birthday instead of getting presents, but then she saw the cash start to pile up and got excited.
Like thousands of teachers statewide, some staff at Beechwood Elementary got layoff notices. When parent-teacher conference time came around, all Beechwood teachers who got layoff notices for next year had pink balloons outside their doors.
Miaad, 7, a first-grader, was upset that she and her older brother wouldn’t get a chance to have Thomas Sullivan as a third-grade teacher. His classroom had one of those pink balloons. (Districts often hand out more layoff notices to employees than the number of people actually laid off.)
“There’s this funny teacher Mr. Sullivan,” Miaad said. “He was going to be my brother Albert’s third-grade teacher, and we don’t want him to leave because he’s a really funny teacher, and (Albert’s) second-grade teacher is going to leave because we don’t have any money.”
That’s when Miaad’s mom, also named Miaad, suggested her daughter start collecting donations for the school from the classmates who were attending her birthday party. Her actual birthday is in January, she said, but she celebrated it earlier this month.
The younger Miaad complained initially, but her mom assured her she’d be getting plenty of presents from her grandparents, aunts and uncles.
When she saw how much cash she had raised from just her student partygoers, she asked her mom to put out the word to family members that she just wanted cash for the school.
“They were really impressed with her doing that,” Mom, Miaad, said. “They ended up giving more money than they would have in presents.”
Grandpa even doled out $1,500, she said.
Though $4,000 doesn’t go far toward keeping a teacher employed, Beechwood Principal Ramon Miramontes said it’ll go a long way to improving the classrooms.
He said the school was about $4,000 short of being able to purchase five Prometheus interactive smartboards – big touch screens that go in the front of the class and allow teachers to digitally access all sorts of interactive learning materials.
Miramontes said that purchasing the fifth board allows the school to get a special deal from the company. Not only is the price-per-board reduced, but the manufacturer is throwing in remote controls for each student that will allow them to enter their answers to the teacher’s questions on the board immediately during class time.
The new boards will be installed before the end of the year, Miramontes said.
The younger Miaad has joined a growing trend of kids who collect money for charity on their birthdays. Her mother said that other parents have asked her about having the same kind of charitable birthday celebrations for their kids, and Miaad may have the same kind of birthday party every year.