West Fargo High School Students Raising Awareness

Addie+Rossow+and+David+Zach+worked+together+on+this+project.

Addie Rossow and David Zach worked together on this project.

Maeson Willaims, Staff Writer

       West Fargo High School English class last year went out of their way to help the community. Three West Fargo High freshmen held a fundraiser for their English project last year.

      In May, former English teacher Shawn Krinke assigned his students a project to find something in the community that they thought was a problem and do something to fix it. Some students chose to raise money, bring awareness, help out at an organization or other solutions. Some groups volunteered at animal shelters, homeless shelters, or retirement communities. Some groups even did smaller ideas where they made sure students had writing utensils for class.

       “Human sex trafficking is an ugly, unfortunate crime happening in our very own state,” Krinke said, “It may surprise people to hear about it, but it seems to be more prolific than people think.”

     Sophomores Addie Rossow, Mariah Schatz and Kyra Barnes took a look at the problem of human sex trafficking.

       “With the oil boom in North Dakota, and the population increased, crime rates associated with human sex trafficking has also increased,” Rossow said.

       They decided to have a hat day for students and a jean day for the teachers in order to raise money and bring awareness about the problem. They were able to raise $170. Originally planning to donate the funds to the 4Her organization, but unable to get a call back from them, the three students decided to donate the funds to The Exodus Road. The Exodus Road is an organization that works all over the world. They fight against modern day human sex trafficking.

       “Many people don’t know that it happens in the United States,” Addie Rossow said, “but it happens everyday. In North Dakota it became more aware to people during the Bakken Oil boom, but it has always been here. If there is one thing I would want everyone to know is that slavery is not just something in our history books, it is not just something in the past. Slavery [modern day human trafficking] happens everyday, everywhere.”