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Pennies brings in dollars
POLK COUNTY (Bay News 9) -- Students in Polk County are learning how quickly pennies add up!
Students at four Polk Schools, including Bethune Academy in Haines City, have collected about 340,000 pennies for local charities as part of the National Penny Harvest.
Fifth grader Sarah Renuart collected 5-pounds of pennies herself.
"I found pennies on the ground, I got change from the store," Renuart said. "It took a lot, it took a long time to collect them."
As she watches them add up she said she's learned just how valuable a penny can be.
"A penny is everything to somebody's life," Renuart said. "I mean if you collect 5,000 pennies you could probably get like $50. I mean, if a poor person got that they'd probably rejoice."
The students started collecting in October.
With help from his grandmother, 5th grader Nicholas Mallory said he brought about 30-pounds of pennies to his class.
"It feels good," Mallory said. "Because you know when you finish collecting all these pennies you're going to give them to people for a good cause."
The bank will count the pennies and the students will decide exactly which charities they want the money to go to when school resumes in January.
They will get together and have roundtable discussions to assess the needs in their communities before voting on different charities.
Polk County based MidFlorida Credit Union is matching the students donations up to $5,000.
The Penny Harvest program began in New York City public schools about 15-years ago.
Since then, it's brought in about $6-million for charitable organizations.
This month a "Penny Harvest Field" is on display in Rockefeller Center with 100-million pennies collected by students there.
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