Northern Highlands Interact Club to join Rotary in life-saving mission

Northern Highlands sophomore Puneet Binepal of Upper Saddle River was so inspired by how a member of the Allendale-Saddle River Rotary Club helped a boy with a congenital heart defect and the impact of his life-changing surgery that she formed a new student club to help others like him.

Binepal created the Highlands Interact Club to complete both a local and international service project. For the international project she will lead an effort to raise funds to support the Gift of Life Foundation, which provides pediatric cardiac care for children with congenital heart defects and don't have access to treatment in developing countries.

The club had around 17 members between 12 and 18 years old at Northern Highlands Regional when Rotary International approved its required application in mid-September. The Interact Club intends to raise money by holding bake sales and car washes at the high school and in the community.

"One of the main points of Interact is to understand the responsibility of helping others in the local and global community," said Binepal, who is the president of the Interact Club. "So I want to raise awareness about different problems that affect people in the global community because living in an affluent area like this one, you tend to take everything for granted and I think it's important for them to look past our own borders and to [help others]."

In August, the Allendale-Saddle River Rotary Club heard of how a local rotary club's $6,000 donation to the Gift of Life Foundation and sponsoring of 13-year-old Nick and his mother, Beverley Brown of Saint Ann, Jamaica, helped Nick receive a life-changing surgery that he should have had before he turned 6-months old, said Diane Eisner-Stroud, an Allendale-Saddle River Rotary Club member.

"I met one of the children over the summer who was [hosted] by [a member of] the Allendale Saddle Riverclub and seeing how even how people our age could help other people around the world was really inspiring," said Binepal, adding that she wants to help more children with similar ailments.

Nick had trouble even walking through Eisner-Stroud's yard after skipping stones across a river.

"He'd get tired and we'd have to carry him," Binepal said. "After his treatment he had recovered so quickly that he was able to race his mom in the park."

He ran around a baseball diamond with his mom, and that was particularly moving because baseball was one of the things that interested him, she said.

Eisner-Stroud said that a lot of times people aren't sure if their donations are getting to the right place, but with this program people can see tangible results.

Interact Vice President Ashley Pagano, a senior who intends to study education at Marist, joined Binepal in her efforts to get the new club started.

"[Interact Club is] great, we've been discussing other opportunities to fund-raise," said Pagano, who wanted to get more involved with the club after participating in a Rotary exchange program in Italy. "We are thinking about a fund-raiser where we make 1,000 peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwiches and deliver them to those [in-need]."

She encouraged other students to get involved.

"They're just all great people - the people that are involved with Rotary - and hopefully more people will join and become more active with the Rotary," Pagano said.

Eisner-Stroud said she hoped the Interact Club would raise awareness of other programs Rotary offers like UN Day, exchange programs and Rotary Youth Leadership Award.

"We hope that with Interact the word can spread within Northern Highlands and some of the kids can take advantage of some of these programs," she said.

Interact Clubs will join other members throughout the world on Nov. 5, at a UN Day at the United Nations building, in New York City.

"They learn about what other kids are doing in other parts of the world and what Rotary has to offer," said Eisner-Stroud, recalling a moving presentation given by a polio victim at a previous event.

E-mail: clyde@northjersey.com