WCHS Support Earns Gold

by: Amanda Oder

Key Club sponsored its first blood drive of the year on Wednesday, September 8. Thirty percent of the senior class donat­ed their blood.

As a result of Willow Canyon students’ motivation, four mem­bers from Key Club and Nurse Ginger Nesbitt attended a small convention at Chase Field on September 15.

Nurse Nesbitt and the four stu­dents from Key Club were invited to speak at the Blood Drive award ceremony at Chase Field. There were about 500 people there, ac­cording to senior and Key Club president Minh Doan.

Valley Vista, Dysart and other schools from the metro-Phoenix area attended, but, according to Doan, “did not do as good as we did.”

The four members from Key Club who went to the conven­tion to accept the award were seniors Minh Doan and Melissa Spindler and juniors Ashton Leo and Krisha Pathak. They won a plaque and banner for the front office.

Willow Canyon will share this championship with Millennium High School in Goodyear. The platinum award was the first place prize, so WCHS came in second with gold.

The next few blood drives will be held on January 12 and May 5 in 2011. There is also one planned in June at Chick-Fil-A. Donors get coupons for more sandwiches at Chick-Fil-A if they donate their blood there.

To prepare for donating blood, students were required to have their blood iron at 12.5 percent. Their height and their weight determined whether or not they were capable of handling losing a pint of blood.

Donors were given water and fruit snacks, Chex Mix or cook­ies immediately after to ward off complications. Some students ex­perienced nausea, blurred vision, and fatigue. Despite the risk, stu­dents still donated 102 units of blood.

Nurse Nesbitt said, “One pint saves three lives!” The amount of student participation per school is measured by the percentage of senior donations, because all stu­dents over the age of sixteen are capable of donating as well.

Junior Alecsa Gipson was grateful for the opportunity to do­nate. “I donated blood because I wanted to help people in need,” said Gipson.