Students celebrate Jimmy Fallon’s $20K donation to Puerto Rico

After Hurrican Maria devasted thousands of homes in Puerto Rico, Syracuse University students came together to aid the island. As a call to action, Puerto Rican ‘Cuse students created a Facebook event, “Syracuse University Puerto Rico” to raise money for families in need.

The proceeds will go to Unidos por Puerto Rico, a public-private initiative started by the office of the First Lady Beatriz Isabel Roselló and a group of companies to help the victims of the storm.

Puerto Rican students all over the United States at various colleges have been gathering together to help donate to Unidos por Puerto Rico. At the University of Pennsylvania, student Jose Diego Toro started a GoFundMe, with the goal of raising $50,000. The fund caught the attention of talk show host Jimmy Fallon who generously made a $20,000 donation to the cause.

Since Fallon’s donation, the entire cause spread even faster and now has $124,229 in current donations with a new goal set to $150,000.

This picture from Magda Ivette’s Instagram page (@magda08) shows the Syracuse University Puerto Rican community juxtaposed with Jimmy Fallon’s generous donation to the GoFundMe.

“One of the biggest problems that students have faced is communication with families back home,” said Paola Santiago, a Puerto Rican student at SU. “Many have had difficulties contacting their families due to poor service and cell towers being down.”

If you would like to donate on behalf of the Puerto Rican student community at Syracuse University please venmo @kukavera. The Puerto Rican students of Syracuse University are trying to collect one big donation to donate to the cause on behalf of Syracuse University.