Teens wrap gifts to raise funds for Project Graduation

By PAMELA GRANT
Cove Leader-Press 

A select group of dedicated high school seniors and their parents have been working diligently wrapping gifts for about a month to raise funds for Project Graduation.
Starting around mid-November, volunteers have baeen wrapping gifts for donations outside of Walmart. As of Sunday, the group has managed to raise an impressive $2,028.62 for Project Graduation. Project Graduation is geared towards giving graduating seniors a safe place where they can all gather after graduation to have fun together. Their goal is to raise between $5,000 and $7,000 to make their night truly special.
“We just want a safe venue for them to celebrate each other one more time,” said Adriana Fox who helped organize the event and supervise the teenagers. “I want them to have a phenomenal night together.”
Fox said that they plan to hold Project Graduation for the class of 2020 at Camp Triumph. She said that the teens will be able to swim and use the go-karts. Fox hopes that they will be able to afford knockerballs and a giant projector so that they can show movies throughout the night. They plan to have plenty of games to play as well as delicious food, much of which will hopefully be donated by the community. Fox had a variety of other ideas that she hopes they’ll be able to implement for the teens so that their night will be as fun as possible. The more money that they raise, the better their night will be able to be.
For the gift-wrapping volunteers, raising money has not been always been easy, made even more difficult by the erratic nature of Texas’ weather.
“It’s been either super hot, super cold, raining, or pouring,” said Fox.
This weekend, the weather has been cold and even a bit wet, but still the teens came to donate their time. In between gift wrapping sessions, high school senior, Dakota Donovan wrapped himself up in a blanket. Despite the occasionally unpleasant weather, Donovan has attended every single one of Project Graduation’s gift-wrapping events.
“It’s just to help out with wrapping for people in need,” said Donovan.
Donovan and the other teens volunteered with the gift-wrapping events all the way up until 3 p.m. on Christmas Eve.
Fox and the teenage volunteers agreed that the community has been nothing but generous. They said that several times, people passing by have donated money without having presents wrapped, and the group is very grateful for the generosity.
Project Graduation will continue even after the holidays with the group trying to hold at least two fundraising events per month.