Teens hope to show politicians a true bipartisan effort

05:28 PM EST on Friday, January 21, 2005

Nick Wellkamp and Matt Tompkins are standing shoulder to shoulder now but they have their differences.

“Me and Nick get into it sometimes,” says Tompkins, a member of the Young Democrats. Wellkamp is a part of the Young Republicans at Eastern. The pair decided it was time to find common ground.

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They and other students from the school pilled into the gym Friday morning for what seemed to be your average friday pep rally, but this one honors more than school athletes. The school was in tight competition with du Pont Manual to see who could raise the most money. Eastern just beat out Manual, who raised $5,000. Eastern will now give their funds to Americare, where 100 percent of the money will go to tsunami relief. So far, schools in Jeffeson County have raised more than $20,000 to help rebuild a region destroyed by disaster.

At Eastern High, the school’s Republican and Democratic clubs worked together to raise more than $5,600 from students for tsunami relief efforts.

“Wouldn't it be a great idea if your Young Republicans club and Young Democrats club could come together after such a divided election season and do something that would benefit others?” asked Wellkamp.

“With this, we can show the politicans in Washington and Frankfort that Democrats and Republicans can work together for a common goal,” said Tompkins.

These students say politics is compromise and say if a bunch of teenagers can work together, adults have no excuse.

“I've never done something of this magnitude before,” Wellkamp says. “It's a great feeling.”

“I think working together is one of the main facts of our lives so we should work together,” says Tompkins.

A rally for relief; a lesson that reaches far beyond the classroom.

Web story produced by Jay Ditzer.