Washington Week: Student Voices (O)

Rutgers collects toys for 'kids of conflict'
By Michelle Walbaum
Daily Targum (Rutgers)
01/19/2007

(U-WIRE) NEW BRUNSWICK, N.J. — Groups from all over Rutgers University came together over the end of last semester to collect more than 600 toys for children in hospitals in northern Israel and southern Lebanon.

The drive was a joint effort by the association and the Middle East Coexistence House on Rutgers' Douglass College campus, said Rutgers College junior Michael Hayoun, president of the American Medical Students Association.

The groups developed a team of students from different backgrounds to help with the toy drive publicity and the collection, said Douglass College senior Danielle Josephs, founder of the house.

Before Thanksgiving break, the team advertised the drive and reminded students to donate to the drive when they clean out their houses.

Donations came from the University community, fraternities, sororities, local religious organizations around New Brunswick and Piscataway, and the Girls Scouts of America.

Drop boxes were set up in student centers, and groups both inside the University and outside in the local community were contacted to help collect items.

The association has done two other toy drives in the last two years to benefit local hospitals. This is the first time they have done a non-local drive and collaborated with another organization.

"This is our first international effort," Hayoun said.

Hayoun first began the toy drives because of his own experiences in hospitals as a child. Toys, he said, eased the pain of the experience of being confined in the hospital.

"It was something to take my mind off the thing up my nose and the intravenous in my arm," he said. "When I couldn't sleep, the nurse would bring me Nintendo to play."

A lot of children in northern Israel and southern Lebanon have been misplaced because of the conflicts there, he said.

"Children need comforting all over the world," he said. "I was one of them in the States."

The Middle East Coexistence House felt the partnership with the AMA would be fruitful because the drive fulfilled both of their goals.

The AMA wanted to help hospitalized children, and the house was concerned about international issues, Josephs said.

The Middle East Coexistence House on Douglass was created to help improve Jewish and Muslim relations at the University and beyond. The house also aims to involve women in international conflict resolution and negotiation. Female students of all nationalities live in the house.

The current conflicts in northern Israel and southern Lebanon were important to the house because of their mission.

"Me and all of my residents are deeply connected to these issues," Josephs said. "The suffering of children on both sides was readily apparent."

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