School Bulletin: Folding cranes for Ukraine

MILWAUKEE (CBS 58) -- Brookfield high school students have become origami masters. This spring the culture clubs at both Brookfield East High School and Brookfield Central High School started folding a thousand paper cranes for Ukraine.

"Folding 1,000 cranes and putting them together represented the wish for peacefulness and happiness," Arisa Okamoto, a Brookfield East student, says. "We thought that this could be something we could support Ukraine as our school district."

The students were inspired by the story of Sadako Sasaki, the Japanese girl who folded more than a thousand cranes before she died from leukemia. She survived the atomic bombing at Hiroshima in 1945, but she and thousands of others suffered from long term health effects. Sasaki seemed to find peace in folding the cranes, and so have the Brookfield students.

"It's definitely addicting," Tanishka Soni, a Brookfield Central High School student, says. "I'll come home and just start folding cranes just because of how soothing it is."

"It was a great was to deviate my mind from all my books," Rishika Ghosh, another Central student, says. "And it helped for a huge cause, which was definitely a bonus."

The culture clubs picked blue and yellow paper to represent Ukraine's flag in the final display, but they took cranes of any size and color. The students also set up stations to teach their peers how to fold a crane, and their efforts spread across the high schools and the district.

"Everybody's been really excited and just wanted to contribute," Rhea Hill, Culture Club Advisor and English Language Learners (ELL) Teacher, says. "At both buildings we've collected from the kitchen staff and from the office staff."

The students finished the final giant crane during the last week of school. They say they hope this project shows Ukrainians they are not alone.

"It's a reminder that [the invasion] is still happening, even though it's been months," Lina Ruiz, a Brookfield East High School student, says.