North Hills Freshmen Orchestrate Unique Cancer Awareness Week

North Hills School District students recently orchestrated a unique, weeklong cancer awareness event that raised hundreds of dollars for a local charity.

North Hills Senior High freshmen Sarah Glatz and Margot California serve on the Teen Advisory Council at Gilda’s Club Western Pennsylvania, and their event garnered $367 for the organization.

The girls brainstormed, planned and coordinated Cancer Awareness Week from Feb. 11 to 15 at North Hills Senior High School. Each day, a different cancer was recognized and signified by a different color. Throughout the week, the pair educated their peers about melanoma, prostate and colon cancer, childhood cancers, breast cancer and the mission of Gilda’s Club Western Pennsylvania.

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They recorded six, daily videos to explain colors that represented each theme day, information about the day’s highlighted cancer and the name and information of a North Hills resident who was touched by the specific cancer. They also created 7,000 ribbons of various colors that were distributed to students in homeroom to wear throughout each day and 20 informational posters with cancer facts or prevention information.

To make the event relevant to their peers, the pair oversaw the creation of two remembrance walls that displayed cards handwritten by students and teachers that contained a remembrance of someone who died from cancer or in celebration of someone who fought cancer.

Each day, they also sold the red Gilda’s Cub bracelets and beaded bracelets at lunch and passed out pamphlets about Gilda’s Club.

Based in the Strip District neighborhood of Pittsburgh, Gilda’s Club is a warm and welcoming place where men, women, teens, and children diagnosed with cancer, and family and friends, join with others to build social, emotional and informational support as a supplement to medical care. For more information, visit www.gildasclubwesternpa.org.

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