On Monday, October 24, a Wolf Lake Middle School student gave donated stuffed animals to Apopka first responders so while in the line of duty, they can give the toys to children as sources of comfort.
The toys were collected during the week of October 17 for the non-profit organization We Care Bears, which eighth grader Jessica Carscadden launched at nine years old.
Carscadden, who recently moved with her family from California to Apopka, collaborated with the school’s BETA Club to collect the toys.
On the morning of Saturday, October 22, students “tagged and bagged” the stuffed animals in preparation for the Monday, October 24 presentation.
At Wolf Lake Middle School on October 24, Carscadden spoke with Wolf Lake Middle School Principal Caroll Grimando and the Apopka Police and Fire departments.
In this posted video, Carscadden explained how her passion for stuffed animals was sparked while living in an orphanage in China, where children there had to share a stuffed animal. It wasn’t until she was adopted that her new family gave her a stuffed animal “to call my very own,” she said.
Carscadden thought up the idea for her non-profit when she was cleaning out her stuffed bears and found many of them were still new with tags on them.
She realized children whom firefighters meet on emergency calls feel frightened, and that they would feel better if firefighters had stuffed animals to give to the children.
Since We Care Bears’ inception, the organization had given away 30,000 stuffed animals, Carscadden said in the posted video.
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