By Vanshika, student Grade 8M
Vogelopvang Utrecht is a bird shelter in Utrecht that gives shelter to 2,500 sick or injured birds from Utrecht and the surrounding areas. This company has been giving shelter to different types of birds ever since 1987, curing birds so they can be released into the wild again. At them moment the Vogelopvang needs approximately 10.000 euros for much needed maintenance. According to Kerstin Steinhart from the shelter, "The financial problem is due to overdue maintenance for which the municipality is responsible. Approximately 10,000 euros are needed to keep the bird’s shelter viable."
Helping the bird shelter
The bird shelter cannot currently accommodating new birds since they cannot properly take care of them. Vogelopvang asked the gemeente Utrecht to pay for maintenance to the shelter. According to Steinhart the Gemeente will try their best to help them.
My classmates and I, however, decided to donate the proceeds from our bake sale which we held on 17 May during the lunch break for the secondary teachers and secondary students.
During mentor class on 17 May we started setting up for the bake sale in the Aula. We assembled the tables and wrote the labels of the food.. We kept all the food in the staff room and some of it in the refrigerator, like the mango lassi. Amber made sure that everyone who was part of this event had something to do. For example, I sold the Nutella cookies, Milah took care of the money, and some of the others were part of the team cleaning up afterwards.
'We got a lot more than we expected'
The food items we sold were chocolate cake, banana bread, brownies, cupcakes, mango lassi, and Nutella cookies. By 13:10, all the items were sold! While the others cleaned up, Milah and I were counting the amount of money we got, and guess what? We got €245 in total, along with some donations from the teachers and us. We were elevated because we got a lot more than we expected, and we hope this might impact the bird sanctuary.