Mill Market

“I too want to say that I am so proud of myself and my classmates that we have been able to develop our ability to become strong and responsible leaders in the community. We, like you, have come far to be here today. To grow up in Lowell and to create our future here.  Our advice to you is always believe in yourself. Always believe in what you’re doing. Believe that you can do it. Do not let your failures define you, but help you grow and learn. Be kind and good to people you meet. Be optimistic and dream big; in this way you will succeed.” ~ Rebecca Bitegetsimana, words and wisdom she shared with LHS students in 2019 in the month before her high school graduation.

Rebecca Bitegetsimana’s Lowell High School Mill Market 

In the winter of 2017 one of my students came to me with a proposal. Our class had just begun to brainstorm for what would become a semester-long action civics project working with Generation Citizen. We were in search of a community issue that we could devote months to addressing - and Rebecca Bitegetsimana, a Congolese refugee and high school junior, had an idea. She had noticed how some classmates, some friends were hungry and  didn’t have enough food at home. Might this be our focus?

Rebecca was intimately familiar with food insecurity. She was born and raised in an Ugandan refugee camp near the border of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, her parents' home until war forced them to flee.  As she would share publicly a year later, “In our refugee camp, life was not easy, but we had no other option...I was often very sick. But I learned that if I worked hard and focused on my education I could get better and could make positive changes in my life.”In our class, Rebecca was bubbly, confident, and endlessly generous. In little time her classmates had coalesced around her idea and together we began studying the effects of food insecurity on education and brainstorming ways to create systemic change. They decided to advocate for the creation of a school-based food pantry, a warm and welcoming space accessible to peers. Over the following months Rebecca and her classmates dialed up local pantries and the handful of school-based pantries across the state. They constructed a cost analysis of what was needed and toured the school scouting for a perfect location. One afternoon Rebecca and a classmate Phatphomviracboth Soeur, a young man from Cambodia, asked if they could use my classroom after school. Unbeknownst to me, they had called up the regional food bank and set up a meeting. Hours later, I watched in awe as these two young people, new to the country, sat with representatives from the food bank and confidently proposed a partnership. Within the month, Rebecca, Both, and their class had secured a commitment and a collaboration between the school and the food bank. Mill Market opened down the hallway from my classroom in the fall of 2017. With classmates, teachers, and city officials in attendance, Rebecca and Both, now seniors and wielding oversized scissors from the city’s Chamber of Commerce, sliced through red ribbon. 

As a senior Rebecca became a leader not only in our classroom, but in Lowell High. She was always nearby, always ready to help -- walking with a peer to find their class, supporting a classmate who was lonely, translating for a new arrival -- endlessly generous with her time. She dreamed of becoming a nurse. Unimaginably, Rebecca passed away in the fall of 2021. Rebecca was a leader, she was an activist, she was a generous, caring young woman and she was an incredible student at Lowell High School.  To honor her life, her generosity, and her spirit we have chosen to dedicate the Mill Market to Rebecca. 

In the fall of 2021, inspired by and building on the work of Rebecca, Both, and their classmates, the Greater Lowell Community Foundation partnered with the Merrimack Valley Food Bank and Catie’s Closet to replicate the student created Mill Market in other public schools in Lowell.