WHS students raise money for miracles

Wahkiakum High School Students are raising money for miracles.

During the past two weeks, members of the student council have been organizing activities to benefit Doernbecher Children's Hospital of Portland, which specializes in treating children. The effort is part of Doernbecher's Kids Making Miracles program which involves school youth raising money for the hospital.

Senior Bradlee Pugh brought the idea to the WHS student council. He remembered it from the years he attended school in Clatskanie, where students participated in the program.

The students formed a committee, with Pugh as the head, and set up fund raising activities at elementary, middle and high schools.

The students led an assembly last Friday at WHS to present the program to the student body.

Guest speaker Linné Svenson, a retired Clatskanie teacher, described the program. Since it began in 1992, over 400 schools have raised over $5 million for Doernbecher, she said. That money helped build a hospital entirely dedicated to treating children, and the money is now used to help the medical staff by funding patient care, medical equipment, and research to improve lives.

Doernbecher serves a wide region, Svenson said, and several people in the audience must be former patients.

Senior Evelyn Clark presented her infant niece, Koda, who recently underwent emergency treatment at Doernbecher.

ASB President Cody Olsen reminded the students he had been a Doernbecher patient when he was five years old. "I'm still here," he quipped. "It's a good place."

The students have presented a wide variety of fund raising activities. They held an outdoor movie night last Friday at the high school, projecting the picture on the back wall of the football grandstand. They have jars with pictures of faculty members on them, and the person collecting the most money will get to kiss a mule at a student assembly. For a donation, students can wear Pugh's Mule cap for a day; they can buy the name-on-the-wall certificate, and they can buy a root beer float during lunch hour. Capping the events next Monday, 7 p.m., seniors and faculty will face off in a basketball game.