Lorena Abad - Steinert High School

Lorena’s project is looking to promote the culture of Ecuador by making Ecuadorian dolls for the Cultural and Heritage Festival that will be held on June 17th at Mercer County Park. We encourage everyone to come and visit the event and Lorena’s booth as she will be giving all proceeds to an elementary school in Trenton. With the money that she earned for her efforts, she’ll be on her path to become a nurse, and if time and money allows her, she’ll someday receive her dream title as nurse-midwife.

 

Emma Bennett - Robbinsville High School

Emma will be attending Indiana University next fall with a major in biology. She hopes to continue doing community service there as she has been doing for the past four year through high school. Emma’s most recent project is a podcast series called Better Together which she worked on with two of the other ONE Project Scholars. This series highlighted local non-profit organizations. One of the organizations that was interviewed was Mercer Street Friends, which is a food bank right here in Mercer County. By raising awareness for this and many other organizations, the Better Together podcast has helped serve the community.

 

Travis Prekop - Hamilton West High School

Travis takes part in many clubs at his school including Student Government, Key Club, HEY Club, Drama, FBLA, DECA, and more. He is also a part of many national honors societies including NHS, NAHS, NTHS, and THS. Travis also is a three year varsity swimmer and a one year varsity lacrosse manager. As a part of his ONE Project scholars program, Travis along with two other members combined forces to bring light to smaller nonprofits in the Mercer County area. They were able to put out a YouTube video and podcast allowing the organization to talk on what they do for the community.

 

Folarin Okulaja - West Windsor-Plainsboro High School South

Folarin Okulaja is a senior at WWPHSS. He played basketball all four years at south and soccer his senior year. Next year he is going on to Princeton University where he will be pursuing an engineering degree. His love of sports inspired his community service project. He wanted to be able to assist any children that wanted to play sports but didn’t necessarily have the equipment necessary. He organized an athletic equipment drive and had over 140 items donated which he in turn donated to after school programs and youth summer camps in the Trenton area with the help of Greg Grant.

 

Nekhi-Ama Troupe - Trenton Central High School

Nekhi-Ama Troupe is a senior at Trenton Central High School’s Visual Performing Arts (VPA) and a member of Delta Gems under the sorority of Delta Sigma Theta INC., Xinos and Kudos under the National Sorority Phi Delta Kappa INC., Kingdom Church: Young Life and a dancer at Watson-Johnson Dance Theatre. She will be attaining Alabama State University for her next level education. She is an active leader, team player and a great role model. Along with volunteering at the Trenton Soup Kitchen and cleaning up parks for community service. Due to all her of community service, she was recognized by The ONE Project Scholar Program were the selected scholars created our own community service projects around the Mercer County area. She chose to do a project regarding the justice system and the knowledge it can give to her peers. NJ laws for eighteen year olds “Hey I’m 18”, and Justice Reformed. With the help from Ivette Santiago-Green from the NJ Courts, she become aware of the benefits she had as an eighteen year old and was prepared to share this information with the others. Mercer County Court System (Mercer County Advisory Committee on minority concerns) Law Day: provide this presentation to all schools to have them understand their rights and responsibilities when they turn 18

 

Zain Sultan - West Windsor-Plainsboro High School North

Zain Sultan is a student dedicated to spending time outside of the classroom to pursue his passion for community service. He is a co-founder of La Convivencia (coexistence), a local non-profit organization dedicated to breaking stereotypes within the community, a member of the teen group at the Trenton Area Soup Kitchen, and the youth ambassador for the West Windsor Human Relations Council. In addition to his community service-related activities, Zain also has a passion for the medical field. Currently, he volunteers at the Princeton Medical Center as a Care Ambassador and conducts medical research on brain cancer at Kean University. As a ONE Project Scholar, Zain held a county-wide food and personal care products drive. Through his non-profit organization, La Convivencia, he organized a Day of Service at the First Presbyterian Church of Hightstown. On May 6, approximately 100 volunteers came to the Day of Service and made over 400 toiletry bags each containing personalized messages of encouragement and hope along with items from the drive. The bags were donated to multiple charity organizations throughout the county, including Arm in Arm and RISE. Utilizing network “Not in our towns” Princeton Partnering with other nonprofits to expand outreach

 

Karina Fernandez - Ewing High School

For Karina's community service project, she teamed up with The Children’s Home Society of NJ, an organization that helps foster kids and low income families. Karina organized a field day with about 15 volunteers and 60 kids aged 3-5 years old at a head start school in Trenton. After the games, each child then potted a plant to take home.