Middle school students raise over $20,000 for Relay for Life

Robious Middle School is celebrating the successful fundraising of over $23,000 for the American Cancer Society’s Relay for Life event, which was held this past weekend at James River High School in Midlothian.

The Center-Based Gifted (CBG) student group, spearheaded by teachers Michael McEwen and Debbye Cook, began fundraising for Relay for Life last year when one of the students learned his father had been diagnosed with leukemia. Last year the group collected over $10,000 for the cause.

Also, two more students, who are siblings, were also affected when their parent was diagnosed with cancer. “The way the family and their friends’ families rallied, I think, was the catalyst for the [school’s] partnership for Relay,” said Principal Javaid Siddiqi.

The students came up with different strategies to more than double the money raised for the cause. Siddiqi said the fundraiser for Relay for Life is a big deal not only because of the amount of money that was raised, but because all of the teams at Robious Middle School are actively involved in some aspect of service. He said that because Robious Middle School is an Expeditionary Learning school it is integral to embed the component of service learning into the minds of students.

“We feel like it is critical component to the development of a whole child so they can see themselves as productive citizens, their role in the community and the role they will play in the future,” he said. “They can, even at this age affect an outcome, a change.”

Cook said she took pride in this particular project because she and McEwen have both seen how cancer has affected many of their students’ lives in some way shape or fashion. “When cancer does strike a family there’s a feeling, especially in children, that there’s absolutely nothing they can do. This, doing this, is empowering to those students,” she said. “It gives them something they can be working towards to help in some way when they really have no control over this disease.”

McEwen agreed. “Our team motto is ‘One person can make a difference’ and our goal was to get them to work as a team, get a look out into the world, see what good they can do, what a difference they can make.”

Student Paige Kobza wrote that she wanted to make a difference for families that have been affected by cancer. “I want to make it seem like they never did lose a loved one. But we can't rewind life. The only thing we can do is to help find a cure. And that is just one part of my goal. My goal is to have a world with less cancer and more birthdays,” Kobza stated.

For student Chloe Hogan, losing a friend named Duffy Hughs to a childhood cancer motivated her to participate in Relay for Life. “The thought that I might be able to prevent other children going through that is … amazing,” she wrote.

Cook said the interesting thing is not every student she and McEwen are teaching is on the Relay team, but every single student they taught has had some part in the fundraising campaign. “We are very proud of our students and the commitment that they’ve had to this,” she said.

How they reached, and surpassed, their goal
Students held a spaghetti dinner, where student and parent volunteers transformed the school’s cafeteria into a restaurant. Students pre-sold reservations for two seating times.

“Our students were the wait staff, and parents helped with the food. It was really a special affair,” Siddiqi said.

Students also combined raising money for the cause with learning about business. They were assigned groups and had to create different business models to sell products. A fair was held for all sixth-grade students who could buy different items such as food and jewelry for a dollar or less. The fair earned over $1,000.

The next project included research projects about different types of cancer. The students created informational brochures and posters in Michael McEwen’s and Debbye Cook’s classes. McEwen took pride in his students finished projects noting that they resembled brochures and posters a patient would see at a doctor’s office educating patients about the cancers.