Omprakash Grant Recipient!

Lacey Worel

2011: Helping Hands, Peru

Lacey Worel grew up in Washington State where her family had a large garden and a small farm. She studied Elementary Education at California State University San Bernardino with a concentration in Psychology. As a college student, she worked with various environmental organizations including the National Parks Conservation Association in Joshua Tree California. After graduating, she worked as a middle school teacher and began her graduate work in the field of Special Education.

For the past 6 months, she has been working in Cusco, Peru with Helping Hands to develop a kindergarten that serves disadvantaged children and focuses on sustainability and nutrition: growing vegetables for the school’s lunch program and using recycled items whenever possible. She is currently writing a daily curriculum for the school that incorporates agriculture, hygiene, recycling and age appropriate learning goals. In addition to overseeing and initiating the development of the school’s garden, she is working as a volunteer coordinator, fundraising and working to implement sustainable building practices such as incorporating a solar oven and harvesting rainwater.

Receiving the Omprakash grant will allow her to continue to support and develop this ecological school by extending her time in Peru. Upon returning to the United States, she will deliver multi media presentations to various schools in the San Francisco Bay Area, Southern California and Washington State. These presentations will include short videos that she has produced, nutritional research based in Cusco that can be compared to the eating habits of students elsewhere, background information on Omprakash and Helping Hands, fundraising ideas and templates for sustainable school projects such as composting or using recycled cardboard instead of paper. In addition to these presentations, she will share her preschool curriculum and greenhouse template with other projects and seek out new partners in Baja Mexico. She will also continue to support and prepare Helping Hands volunteers and work to update the organization’s website.