Eastern Lebanon County EA exercises "practical compassion"
Occasionally there is a story about an individual in which life appears to come full circle. The kind of story where a person overcomes childhood poverty, earns a college education, and then returns to her birthplace to help in a time of need. Sandrine Macena Longenecker, a young woman adopted from Haiti and raised in Lebanon County, has that kind of story. In 1990 Sandrine Macena was six years old, the youngest of 10 siblings living in desperate poverty in Haiti. Her father had died and her mother could not care for her.
Around the same time Michelle and Dale Longenecker of Schaefferstown, PA decided to adopt a child and brought Sandrine to the United States.
Members of the Eastern Lebanon County Education Association (ELCEA) organized activities to support Sandrine – and to send money and help to a country in desperate need.
Sandrine, now a registered nurse working in the medical surgical unit at the Good Samaritan Hospital, will return to Haiti as part of a medical team sponsored by Practical Compassion, a humanitarian organization dedicated to improving the lives of Haitian children. Sandrine is a 2004 graduate of Eastern Lebanon County High School. Her mother is an elementary teacher in the district. The ELCO Education Association recently organized a casual dress day to raise funds to assist Sandrine’s medical team. A check for $2,000 was presented to Sandrine on Friday, February 12. According to George Zimmerman, head of Practical Compassion, the entire $2,000 will be spent to purchase antibiotics.
After the check presentation, Sandrine and her mother Michelle spoke about the events that brought Sandrine to Lebanon County. Through their church, the Longeneckers contacted a Haitian pastor’s wife who ran an orphanage. Many months after starting the adoption process they left for a meeting with this woman who would bring along pictures of children so they could choose a child to adopt. Michelle recalled worrying about how she would chose one thereby rejecting the others. When they arrived at the meeting, the woman had only one picture - Sandrine’s.
For two years, the Longeneckers sent money to care for Sandrine and worked on finalizing adoption paperwork. In February 1992, they traveled to Haiti and brought her home, landing in Philadelphia. When asked about her first memory of America Sandrine emphatically replied “Snow!” When she arrived Sandrine could only speak Haitian Creole and began school at Schaefferstown Elementary. She rapidly made friends, learned the language, and became a successful student, graduating from high school and earning a BS in Nursing from Bloomsburg University. In 2006, Sandrine received an envelope of pictures of family members sent by her mother in Haiti. Sandrine does not know exactly where her mother lives, but she plans to try to contact her biological family while in Haiti, though most villages do not have names.
At Sandrine’s destination, there are few roads, no electricity and no mail delivery. Along with Sandrine, her team will include a physician, a physician’s assistant, and a physical therapist with expertise in wound care. One of the sites they will visit is Leurboug, about 20 miles outside the city, where Practical Compassion supports a school. There has been little communication but they know from satellite pictures that the building is still standing. It is their understanding that no medical teams have been to this area. They expect to find many survivors with infected wounds, creating a critical need for antibiotics. Accompanying the medical team will be several members of the board of Practical Compassion who will assess the damage and take food and other supplies for the approximately 100 children currently in their care.
More information on Practical Compassion can be found on their website www.PracticalCompassion.org.