Irvine, California (CNN) — It wasn’t until Yash Gupta pennyless his eyeglasses in taekwondo use that he satisfied usually how many he relied on them.

His medication was so high that he had to wait a week to get a new pair.

For Gupta, afterwards a high propagandize freshman, those 7 days were a blur. Literally.

“I usually couldn’t see anything,” pronounced Gupta, now 17. “I couldn’t see in a classroom; we would get simply distracted. … Just simple things we used to do each day, we couldn’t do.”

Gupta’s eyes were also non-stop to a many incomparable problem. He saw on a Internet that some-more than 12 million children worldwide don’t have a visual eyewear they need (PDF).

“It’s usually a sum waste for them, given (if) we can’t see anything … we unequivocally can’t make a many of a preparation you’re being given,” he said. “It would be unfit for them to entirely grasp their potential.

“I had this problem for one week, though these kids have these problems for their whole lives.”

So during usually 14, Gupta started Sight Learning, an classification that collects used eyeglasses from optometrists and donates them to organizations that can broach them to children in need.

Since 2011, Gupta has donated 9,500 pairs of glasses, value scarcely $500,000, to immature people in Haiti, Honduras, India and Mexico.

For Gupta, who has ragged eyeglasses given he was 5 years old, a thought of repurposing aged eyewear done sense. Most of his family members wear glasses, and usually acid his possess home yielded present results.

“I found 10 to 15 pairs usually fibbing around a residence in pointless drawers,” Gupta said.

He satisfied those eyeglasses alone could assistance 10 or 15 children. So, with assistance from his father, Gupta set adult his classification and approached internal optometrists, who concluded to put out dump boxes where patients could present their used eyeglasses after removing a new pair.

“That initial communication was unequivocally earnest for me,” he said. “Some of (the optometrists) already had pairs of eyeglasses that they had usually amassed over a years that they didn’t know what to do with.”

In a past 3 years, Gupta has left on countless trips to India and Mexico, where he not usually provides eyeglasses though also assists a doctors and volunteers during eye clinics.

Those who work with him see his age as an asset.

“He works tough and has good initiative, though some-more importantly, he brings such good appetite — and that sets a tinge for everyone,” pronounced Dr. Greg Pearl, boss of a California section of Volunteer Optometric Services to Humanity.

Gupta says that being in a margin is a best partial of his work.

“That confused demeanour a initial time (children) get glasses, and usually saying that spin into fun and complacency … it’s usually unequivocally inspiring,” he said.

Gupta knows that a eyeglasses he’s providing can make a large impact.

“A lot of times, these families are in poverty,” he said. “With a good education, we know, they can get a good pursuit and get a good career.”

Helping others motivates Gupta, whose family immigrated to a United States from India when he was usually 1 year old.

“We had a unequivocally tough time adapting,” Gupta recalled. “I (am) sensitive to people who (are) struggling.”

Gupta, a comparison in high school, helps account his work by education younger students after school, and he spends about 20 hours a week collecting and shipping a glasses. He skeleton to continue when he gets to college, and he has his eye on expanding into new territory.

“Right now, we’re partnered with organizations that do general work. But in a future, I’d like to move this use to middle cities in a U.S.,” he said.

Gupta has gotten a lot of courtesy for his work, including being respected during a White House eventuality in July. But he says other people his age are also anticipating ways to give back.

“I consider there’s a myth with a generation,” he said. “Many of my friends are doing things to urge their communities.

“Kids are ardent and can make a difference. It’s usually a matter of anticipating out what we caring about and focusing on that.”

Want to get involved? Check out a Sight Learning website to see how to help.