The five screens in the auditorium project a slide that depicts a dilapidated irrigation system in rural Uganda. Little more than a hole in the ground, the water flows straight through the soil into the hands of families, who use it to drink, cook, and bathe. Standing onstage under the slide, junior Bella Evan-Cook, dressed in a gray t-shirt and leggings, tells the audience of her experience transforming this irrigation system into a fully functional one, capable of serving a village’s community. She clicks to the next slide, and the image of a cement structure with a pump fills the auditorium.

On Wednesday, November 29, Evan-Cook gave a Morning Ex presentation to grades 3-12 on her trip to Kaberamaido, Uganda over the summer with the Chicago-based nonprofit Surge for Water, an organization working to provide sustainable clean water and sanitation to those in need.

Evan-Cook first described the global clean water and sanitation crisis—663 million people worldwide do not have access to clean water, and 2.5 billion live without adequate sanitation. Next Evan-Cook talked about her involvement with Surge for Water and her experience in Uganda building infrastructure and teaching classes to Ugandan students.

Surge for Water also sponsors Evan-Cook’s club at Parker, the Clean Water Club, which was established in November 2015r—her first year at Parker. “I came to Parker in ninth grade, and I went to a few club meetings, and I asked the leaders how they started their clubs, and they said it was super easy,” Evan-Cook said. “I’ve always been someone who wants to give back and help out in the community in some way, but I wasn’t so sure about what cause I wanted to support.”

Evan-Cook soon became connected through her mother, Victoria Drake, to Shilpa Alva, co-founder and executive director of Surge for Water. Evan-Cook and Drake volunteered for Surge, and as the mother-daughter pair got to know Alva, a partnership emerged. “It was Shilpa who asked if Bella would start the Clean Water Club at Parker,” Drake said, “and then if she would partner the Parker club with a sister school in Uganda.”

Evan-Cook got inspiration from a student at Lane Tech. “She actually had started a club partnered with Surge,” Evan-Cook said, “so that’s also where some of my inspiration came from, and she gave me a list of all the ideas.”

The club, now in its third year, has evolved from making collages to raising money to support their cause. “This year we’ve now started selling soap, so that’s a big investment, kind of to help the club grow, and take more action,” Evan-Cook said. “We’re hoping to raise enough money to build a well by the end of the year.”

Although its activities have changed, according to Evan-Cook the club’s size has not, remaining at about 8-10 people since its creation. “It’s not a huge club,” Evan-Cook said, “but I think smaller members are also good because it’s easier to communicate with each other and make sure we’re all on the same page and get more things done and not have to worry about whether or not a lot of people are going to come to the meeting.”

Junior Sasha Zhukova, Evan-Cook’s co-president, agreed. “I think the club has a good amount of people because everyone who comes to the meetings is genuinely interested in the club and comes to every meeting we have,” Zhukova said. “I would love for more people to join, but I think the people we already have help make Clean Water Club the great environment that it is right now.”

Evan-Cook was the sole member of the club who traveled to Uganda—a trip organized by Alva. “Since my club is called the Clean Water Club,” Evan-Cook said, “they realized that a lot of the schools in Uganda have health clubs.” A Ugandan health club consists of hygiene-education programming such as menstrual hygiene, teeth care, and hand washing.

For Evan-Cook, the most memorable part of the trip was the reaction of the children to her and the other travelers. “A lot of times when we’d visit the schools,” she said, “the kids would come up to me or any of the other people who were with us, and they’d give us these letters, and it would be like, ‘Oh, can you please be my friend,’ ‘I’m so happy to see you,’ ‘I’m so happy you’re here,’ ‘You’ve finally come to visit us.’”