In a couple of weeks, a shipment of school supplies will travel from Coral Gables to a cinder block school in Fatima, one of Haiti's poorest regions.

The Fatima schoolchildren, often exhausted from hunger and walking miles up a mountain, will arrive to find they now own brand new backpacks, spiral notebooks, color pencils and even sneakers and T-shirts.

And it's all thanks to a 13-year-old.

Actually, Elizabeth Perez, an eighth-grader at Carrollton School of the Sacred Heart in Coconut Grove, was just 10 when she came up with the concept of Backpack Buddies, a project she started in 2006 to collect supplies to benefit children at Haiti's L'Ecole Pere Boniface School, better know as the PEBO School.

Elizabeth and her parents, Linda and Luis Perez, learned about the school from the Rev. Pere Boniface, an 85-year-old Haitian priest who has been a friend of the family for decades.

In 2004, Boniface was in town and talked about the new school in the family's living room.

He shared stories about the difficulties children attending the school encounter, including lack of food, clean water and hygiene.

``You can't overstate the level of poverty over there,'' Linda said.

Elizabeth, quiet and soft-spoken, sat among the adults with friends from her school, watching and listening intently. She was inspired to do something.

That something turned out to be starting Backpack Buddies.

``I wanted to help,'' she said simply.

And the supplies began arriving in Haiti in 2006 from her Coral Gables home.

This year was her best, with 2,455 items soon to be shipped to Haiti. It will take weeks for the supplies to arrive. The trip begins with Lady Lotmore, a commercial vessel that will set sail from the Miami River. At Port de Paix, the supplies will be loaded on a truck that takes them up treacherous mountain terrain until the road ends. From there, the 17 shipping cartons will be carried on foot.

Elizabeth begins her annual drive for supplies in the summer by sending out letters to friends and family.

At such a young age, she already is well organized. She has created a notebook with photos of the school, letters from Boniface and even a thank you letter from the school's principal. She also does an inventory at the end of each drive to keep track of her progress.

``The first year we filled big boxes with composition books,'' her mother said. ``We later learned to distribute the supplies by weight so the boxes wouldn't be too heavy.''

The seed was truly planted 30 years ago, when Elizabeth's father first traveled to Haiti with the nonprofit Amor en Acción, a Catholic lay missionary group of the Archdiocese of Miami.

The organization specializes in helping the people of Haiti and the Dominican Republic. In Port de Paix, Amor en Acción provides salaries for 85 teachers and serves 5,000 children in 25 rural schools, according to co-founder Alicia Marill.

On that first trip, Luis met Boniface. They struck a friendship and the Perez family has since been part of several Amor en Acción efforts to help Haiti, such as a relief effort in 2004 after Tropical Storm Jeanne. Luis also serves as the organization's attorney.

Marill, who was among that first group to travel to Haiti on behalf of Amor en Acción, forged a friendship with Luis and his family.

``What can you say about people that you love and admire,'' Marill said. ``They have been supportive of my endeavors, people of great Christian and Catholic background, who not have not only collaborated financially but also opened their home.''

The family's dedication to community service not only benefits Haitians.

Elizabeth, for example, is also involved in community service through her school and is an altar server at St. Augustine Catholic Church in Coral Gables. She sings in the choir.

But she can't forget the plight of the children in Haiti.

Next she plans to begin a separate drive to collect hygiene products.

``She's just a really good kid,'' her mother said.

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