The Long Run Fellow Member SINAL Do Vale, Brazil is crowdfunding for the local school in Santo Antonio to build a rain water catchment system for their garden. You can help!

The school Hervalina Diniz, a highly under-served and under-resourced school in the periphery of Rio, dreams to build a rain water catchment system to lower the high costs they pay for water. Despite the abundant water sources of the nearby Atlantic Rainforest, the school still must pay high prices to purchase water.

The school is determined to transition to more sustainable sources. The water system would allow the students to maintain a garden, eat healthier, and use the money now spent on water for better education.

Sinal has been working with the students, teachers and director at the school for the past four years to transition the school towards more sustainable infrastructure. Last year, they started a school garden as part of a project called Aventura dos Sabores that worked to reconnect children with local, healthy food through games and adventures. The project resulted in the building of a school garden that the students care for.

Because the school has to pay for water, maintaining the garden has become complicated. SINAL are crowd-funding to build the rain water catchment system so that they will always be able to water their plants, even in the dry season!

To deal with the new pressures of climate change that are facing peri-urban areas like Santo Antonio (landslides, water scarcity, deforestation), the town is desperately in need of more sustainable infrastructure and practices. By working with the school, SINAL hopes to empower the new generation to learn and participate in these more ecological structures such as water catchment that can then be replicated throughout the neighborhood and in surrounding towns.

Please click this link to donate (every dollar helps).