700 MPS kids surprised with gifts and a visit from Santa Claus

 

MILWAUKEE (CBS 58) -- Christmas came early for hundreds of kids on Milwaukee's south side on Friday, Dec 15.

Kids at Hayes Bilingual Elementary school were surprised with gifts and a visit from Santa Claus. 

The auditorium of the school was magically transformed into a winter wonderland.

The transformation came as big surprise to everyone in the building, except for one person.

"The hardest thing was keeping it a secret from my staff and my assistant principal, everyone, today was the first day people found out about it," said Gabriel Lopez, Principal of the elementary school.

A few months back, Lopez was contacted by the Daisie foundation, a non-profit looking to help women and children who live in underserved communities.

The foundation wanted to pull off what Lopez thought was the impossible.

"I was like wow, this entails a lot," said Lopez.

The Chicago based organization wanted to bring every kid in the school a Christmas gift, something they said not every kid gets.

"We wanted to create this opportunity of exposure of reembrace, celebration for our children who may or may not get Christmas because of a lot of different things going on," said Julie Hightower, Executive Board President with the Daisie Foundation.

Hightower went on to say that sometimes Christmas can look different for everyone.

"Holiday times can be very happy, but also very sad for many people and so we want to bring joy and our assignment, and our goal is for the kids to smile from the inside out," said Hightower.

So, with a little Christmas magic and a partnership with the National Latino Law Enforcement Organization, a Christmas miracle was pulled off.

Hundreds of kids and teachers were surprised by Santa, his Elves, and a few local leaders all bringing holiday cheer.

"I thought for a second, I was hallucinating," said one student who was surprised.

Another student said the gifts reminded her of home.

"I was so surprised, because that was my favorite game, because always played that with my family at taxes and I miss them a lot," said a student. 

"It's our honor it's our joy, it's our assignment, and we want to make sure that if no one else remembers them for the holidays the daisy foundation and the Latino association has done that," said Hightower.

The Daisie foundation doesn’t just help in Milwaukee, they also help throughout Houston and Chicago, and by the end for this holiday season they would have helped more than 2,200 students in getting holiday cheer.