Finding a cure, one step at a time
High school community does its part to support cancer patients and fund research
By Erick Rommel
Head Staff Writer
SOUTH AMBOY — Many team fundraising efforts often start slowly. Not at Cardinal McCarrick High School. Here the students, faculty and staff set no limits when it came to participating in the Relay for Life. The May 18 event took place across the state and around the country, raising money for cancer research.
Michelle Brielmeier, team captain and chemistry teacher at the school first learned about the annual event at her local gym and was inspired to get involved. She brought the idea to Jean Kline, the school’s principal.
While there were many reasons to not participate — it was approaching the end of the school year and students had already volunteered and raised money for several other charitable causes — Kline approved the school’s involvement. “When these kinds of things happen you get on board because something good is going to happen,” she said.
Kline was right. Out of the 46 teams participating at the relay’s Matawan location, Cardinal McCarrick High School’s Eagles of Hope placed second, raising $9,400.
Every dollar counts
Students set aside nine days in late April and early May to raise that money. “It was really very successful,” said Brielmeier. “Everyone just kind of goes for it. They go home and talk to their parents. [Their parent’s] companies write checks for donations.”
Students also used the Internet to raise money and awareness. Jaimie Pace, a junior, and her mother e-mailed their family and friends to tell them about the effort. That e-mail and similar ones from other students led to $1,300 of the total amount raised.
With a minimum $1 donation, donors received either a paper star or moon displayed in a classroom, personalized with their name or the name of a cancer patient they know. For a $5 donation, donors could decorate a luminaria to be placed at the walk site.
With many contributions, people gave far more than the minimum requested; several donated $100 each. At the end of their fundraising efforts, students raised $2,000 for the paper stars and moons and $7,400 selling luminarias.
On the day of the relay, the Cardinal McCarrick High School team donated their time as well. Despite the school’s prom taking place the same day, more than 60 people took assigned shifts on the track from noon until midnight to ensure someone was always walking.
Throughout the day, organizers provided entertainment, food and guest speakers who had cancer or had family members who died from cancer. “It made everyone more aware of everything you can do to help,” Pace said. “I actually almost cried.”
In the evening, several students joined the group preparing and lighting the luminarias. Last year, there were 400; this year, the relay featured 1,200. Of those, 880 were sold by Cardinal McCarrick High School students.
Personal connection
Almost everybody knows someone who has or had cancer. Pace’s grandmother fought the disease. Kline lost both her father and father-in-law. One student lost a family member earlier in the year.
One cancer survivor is well known at Cardinal McCarrick High School. Doctors diagnosed Melanie Good, a junior at the school, with leukemia Jan. 25. 2002, two months after she first became sick. She is now in remission and recently celebrated the two-year anniversary of her last chemotherapy appointment.
Because she’s gone through cancer treatment, Good knows the Relay for Life’s importance. “This is for research,” she said. “It’s for more than just one person.”
*The attached/referenced article was originally published in The Catholic Spirit, the official newspaper of the Diocese of Metuchen, and is protected under U.S. and international copyright law