For the second year in a row, 9-year-old Abigail Willi held a bake sale to raise money for a worthy cause. This year, the fourth-grader from Block Island picked the Anderson Cabot Center for Ocean Life as the recipient. Hear more from our youngest donor!
You do a bake sale fundraiser every year. How did you come up with that idea?
Abigail: I had a lot of ideas because I knew I really wanted to raise money for different things. My mom helped me decide that a bake sale would be best because we could get our friends to help us. It worked so well the first year I decided to keep going!
Why did you decide to donate your bake sale money to the Anderson Cabot Center?
In school we talk a lot about the ocean since I live on an island. And where I live just banned plastic bags and balloons, so we talk a lot about keeping sea animals healthy by limiting plastics. I knew I wanted to help ocean life and I basically just looked online to find what aquariums have animal rehabilitation and research programs, and the Anderson Cabot Center came up and that looked really cool.
What’s your favorite ocean animal?
Octopus (turtles are a close second)
What do you want to be when you grow up?
A teacher
Tell me what it was like to meet a real scientist.
Well, he looked really smart but he was really nice and interested in what I did and what we do on Block Island. He talked to me like a grown-up. He was interested in hearing about the whales around where we live. He gave me (and my brother) a whale stuffed animal. He was really nice.
What do you wish kids like you knew about the New England Aquarium and the Anderson Cabot Center?
That you help really cool animals and the Aquarium even has some really rare animals like a blue lobster! You help turtles when they get really cold and get stuck by Cape Cod. They rescue them and bring them to warmer water. They really care about helping the ocean and they are nice to the animals they have at the Aquarium.
From all of us at the Anderson Cabot Center for Ocean Life: Thank you, Abigail, for helping us protect the blue planet!
As a nonprofit institute, the Anderson Cabot Center relies on the support of people who are passionate about protecting our ocean. Support us today.