Monica Alba, who was visiting her family in Mexico when the tsunami hit, immediately felt compelled to participate in the global relief efforts.

"I wanted to do everything I could to help," the high school senior said.

Alba, a Willow Glen resident, is vice president of Presentation's Amnesty International club. While in Mexico, Alba emailed Amnesty moderator and Presentation economics teacher Jaya Subramanian, concerned about the well-being of Subramanian's family in India—most of the family was OK. She also queried the teacher about ways the Presentation community could pitch in.

After Alba and other students expressed a desire to help, the school's teachers decided to assist the girls' efforts in organizing a Jan. 5 meeting.

That first meeting drew nearly 50 girls, including students who are members of Amnesty International and the Community Involvement and the Red Cross clubs. Those numbers quickly grew as the group learned that several students had distant relatives who were affected or faced close calls from the tsunami overseas, Alba said.

Numerous students were at the forefront of the relief effort including high-schoolers Alba, Laura Aguirre, Victoria Ruiz, Katie Heil, Alison Burke, Allison Able, Tiffany Pham and Mai-Chi Vu.

The group of volunteers organized a two-week fundraiser, running from Jan. 10 through Jan. 21 with $14,000 goal. The students also chose Oxfam as their charity of choice.

In order to demonstrate the magnitude of the natural disasters, Burke prepared a PowerPoint presentation on the affected countries that was shown in each homeroom class on the first day of the fundraiser. Other students prepared more detailed accounts of how a particular country was affected, which the girls will read over the public announcement system throughout the 11-day period.

English teacher Maggie Dellamano and Subramanian also helped draft donation letters to send home with students and alumni. Volunteers have collected the money during each homeroom period. Some students brought in checks from their parents for as much as $200, while other girls emptied their purses and donated their change.

"It's been kind of neat because it seems like a lot of people wanted to donate and it's easy to send it in with your daughter," Dellamano said.

The main portion of the fundraising event took place on Jan. 12, with a 20-line phone bank that was worked for three hours. Those calling were trained on how to use a prepared script and the procedure for accepting credit card and check donations. Round Table Pizza on Lincoln Avenue donated pizzas for the event, and the Bank of America on Meridian Avenue waived the $250 processing fee for credit card donations. The school raised a total of $10,740.

To Subramanian and Dellamano, the girls' desire to help was a natural extension of the overall giving culture at the school, which includes various holiday drives and the social justice issues taught through various courses.

"It amazing how [the effort] comes directly from them," Subramanian said.

Subramanian said it's as if the teens gathered in the midst of the tragedy and asked themselves, "What can I do in my own community?"

To aid tsunami relief efforts, contact Oxfam International at 800.77.OXFAM or on the web at www.oxfamamerica.org; American Red Cross at 800.HELP.NOW or www.redcross.org; and UNICEF at 800.4UNICEF and www.unicefusa.org.