Four students and one adviser from Denton High School are using their spring break this week to serve people more than a thousand miles away.

The students— Cindy Thompson, Lauren Featherstone, Gina Sarvis and Kayla Tunnell, all members of the school’s Interact Club — and their trip adviser, English Language Learning Center teacher Robin Hay, traveled to Chinandega, Nicaragua, last weekend.

DRC/David Minton

From left, Denton High School Interact Club members Cindy Thompson, Lauren Featherstone, Gina Sarvis and Kayla Tunnell and teacher Robin Hay have traveled to Nicaragua this week to volunteer.

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They will help build a maternity wing at a local hospital and will educate schoolchildren in rural villages on the importance of hygiene.

“It’s such a great opportunity to go and help these kids and these mothers, and everyone there. It’s too good to pass up,” Thompson said.

The five volunteers from Denton High are accompanying representatives from the University of North Texas Rotaract organization and the Rotary Club of Denton-South, who are joining with the Rotary International Friends of Nicaragua organization to assist in the efforts in the Central American country.

Thompson said she looked forward to bringing a smile to a child’s face. That, she said, would be a reward in itself.

Throughout this week, the volunteers said, they would help build and paint a maternity wing for a hospital. Upon their arrival Saturday, the Denton High students said they planned to prepare packets equipped with toothbrushes, toothpaste, soap and bandages, mostly donated by Denton businesses.

The items are expected to be distributed along with a pamphlet written in Spanish that explains how to use the products.

Such items are not easily available to the people who will receive them, volunteers said.

“When you see the struggles and worries that these people go through, our worries will seem insignificant,” Hay said.

She said she and the students were excited about the opportunity to improve the lives of the people they will serve.

Tunnell, who plans to pursue a service career, said the trip would allow her an experience that some people will never have — to help someone in need.

Scott Spaulding, Denton High Interact Club sponsor, said that for more than two years he’s attempted to send a group of students to assist with the Rotary projects in Nicaragua, but this was the first year the school was successful in raising the money needed. Students began preparing for the trip last summer, putting on a number of fundraisers and collecting donations.

Preparing for the trip took a lot of work, Spaulding said, and he’s excited at the opportunities his students are getting this week.

“The experience will give them more education than school ever will,” he said. “This is obviously the biggest thing we’ve ever done as an organization.”

BRITNEY TABOR can be reached at 940-566-6876. Her e-mail address is btabor@dentonrc.com .