Fifth-Grader's Foundation Aided by Township Events

During last week's township Christmas tree lighting, hundreds of kids wanted to greet Santa and have a chance to provide their wish lists for Christmas.

To do so, all they needed to do was get a ticket—which they could get from a table staffed by The Vowel Foundation, a registered non-profit founded in November by Auten Road Intermediate School fifth-grader Maya Karkhanis with the goal of helping provide support to autistic students and schools.

Her first goal was to raise money for a school teaching autistic students in Delhi.

"The tuition for one student is about $300, so that was my goal," Maya said.

She started out by recruiting about 10 of her classmates and neighbors to help assemble bookmarks and packages of "Reindeer noses" (red candy balls) and "Snowman poop" (mini-marshmallows), which she has been selling at event like the tree lighting and at Angelo's Pizza. 

She's also hoping to purchase some physical therapy equipment for use in area schools for autistic children.

Maya said she has an autistic sister, which led to her desire to help others.

Her mother, Priya, said the foundation got a big boost from the tree lighting event, which she credited Parks and Recreation Director Rich Resavy for helping arrange.

Maya will be retuning to Angelo's Friday, from about 5 p.m. to 9 p.m. to offer her Vowel Foundation goods to donors.