HISTORY OF THE SAN PEDRO CHISTMAS COLLECTION...
The San Pedro Christmas Collection began during the 2020 pandemic. The goal was to host a series of special fundraising events at bars and restaurants to help provide local families with a meal, supplies, and toys during the pandemic when many people could not work and were struggling financially. At the same time, these special events encouraged support of local businesses who were also struggling. The collection continued in 2021 and raised $38,000 BZD. As San Pedro slowly recovered from the pandemic, workers and families returned to the island and the number of children on the island more than doubled. The 2022 collection efforts raised $41,000 BZD and provided meals and toys for 2,245 local children.
2023 & 2024 GOALS
After 3 years of growth and pandemic recovery, it is time for change. We’ve received valuable feedback from the community supporting these events, and we are shifting gears accordingly. We hope to raise $40,000 BZD this year and again next year to provide sustainable resources to local children to enhance their education and livelihood in the following ways:
Organized for this year...
- Provide playground equipment at Boca del Rio Park for all San Pedro children and families to enjoy.
- Provide STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Mathematics) kits to ACES School to foster creative problem-solving, collaboration, and critical thinking.
- Provide music equipment to Isla Bonita School to enhance student livelihood and help grow their marching band.
- Provide laptops to New Horizon School to help them develop a computer lab for their students. The Boca del Rio playground location was selected in consultation with San Pedro’s Town Council who will install the playground equipment donated by San Pedro Christmas Collection. ACES, Isla Bonita, and New Horizon were randomly selected by the collection committee as beneficiaries for the 2023 fundraising efforts, and each school selected their own preferred donation items (STEAM kits, music equipment, or laptops). Next year...
The 2024 San Pedro Christmas Collection benefactors will include RC and Holy Cross schools and another community project. Any additional funds donated beyond our $40,000 BZD annual goal will be used to provide supplies to our island preschools.
2023 EVENTS
We continue to strive to create fun new event ideas and include new venues because we want everyone to truly enjoy these fundraisers while supporting the community through your participation. We have been mindful in our 2023 planning to spread out the events between August and December to help avoid “fundraiser fatigue.” We respect everyone’s generosity and love for the community, and we understand that there are a lot of donation requests, fundraising events, and toy drives towards the end of the year that deserve support. We are grateful for every donating business, venue, volunteer, and participant and look forward to seeing you at the 2023 events – let the FUN begin!
- Saturday, August 12: Carnival, Crocs Sunset Sports Bar.
- Sunday, September 10 (St. George’s Caye Day Weekend): Secret Beach Floating Bar Crawl, several Secret Beach bars.
- Wednesday, October 11: Christmas Trivia Extravaganza, Silent Auction, & Wine/Booze Pull, Toast Seaside Boozery and Grill.
- Tuesday, October 31 (Halloween): Witch Race, Costume Catwalk Contest, Pine-O-Lantern Carving Contest, & Silent Auction, Wayo’s Beach Bar.
- Thursday, November 9: Hollywood Squares, Nauti Crab
- Sunday, November 19: Lip Sync Party & Silent Auction, Someplace South CafeBar.
- Wednesday, December 6: Dinner Gala, Silent Auction, & Wine Pull, Purple Pelican
- Tuesday, December 19: Stew’s Putt Putt Extravaganza, The Cluckington Challenge Boat Crawl, Coconut Cafe, Stella’s Sunset, Castaway, Coco’s Loco, Caliente, & Casey’s Boatyard and Grill. In-kind donations may be purchased on our Amazon wish list...
https://www.amazon.com/hz/wishlist/ls/24NCHCEUYC8PK?ref_=wl_share
Monetary donations accepted via PayPal, Venmo, Zelle or cash....
PayPal:
https://www.paypal.me/rachjensen11
Venmo:
https://account.venmo.com/u/rachjensen11
(914-364-1126)
Zelle: [email protected] (914-364-1126)
Cash: Call Ivan Luna (+501 610-0026)
FOR MORE INFORMATION please contact us: [email protected] -OR- call 610-0026
