{"id":6638,"date":"2013-04-03T12:05:36","date_gmt":"2013-04-03T17:05:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/social.plymouth.k12.in.us\/perspective\/?p=6638"},"modified":"2014-04-07T07:15:25","modified_gmt":"2014-04-07T12:15:25","slug":"phs-students-are-getting-ready-to-donate-blood-for-the-red-cross","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/social.plymouth.k12.in.us\/perspective\/?p=6638","title":{"rendered":"PHS Students are Getting Ready to Donate Blood for The American Red Cross"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Members<\/a>

Members of the American Red Cross will be coming to Plymouth High School on Thursday April, 11 to collect blood. Photo by: Patricia Ortiz<\/p><\/div>\n

By Patricia Ortiz-Corona<\/em><\/p>\n

On April 11 Plymouth High School will be helping in saving lives by hosting its annual Blood Drive.
\n
\nAccording to Mrs. Laura Kruyer, who is coordinating the event, The Blood Drive has been going on for, \u201cat LEAST 25 years to when I was a student at PHS and Mr. Schockney was organizing it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mrs. Kruyer states that the blood drive got started because there is always a need for blood.\u00a0 While donating blood can have a rewarding feeling, it also, \u201cenables many high school students to donate for the first time and develop a sense of community as they learn the importance of giving,\u201d states Mrs. Kruyer.<\/p>\n

The American Red Cross is responsible for collecting the blood, and they come to PHS twice a year (once in the fall and then again in the spring) to collect blood.\u00a0 Mrs. Kruyer states that once the blood has been collected it has to go through a series of tests (HIV, hepatitis B and hepatitis C, and other diseases) to make sure that the blood is healthy for another person to receive.\u00a0 She goes on to explain that the \u201capproved blood donations then go to local hospitals for use.\u00a0 Almost everyone during his\/her life will know someone who needs a blood transfusion.\u00a0 They may be [in a] car accident or trauma victims, cancer or transplant patients, or sick people with sickle cell disease or other blood disorders.\u00a0 There is no substitute and still only one source of blood for transfusion – volunteer blood donors.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mrs. Kruyer and The American Red Cross are not the only ones involved in helping The Blood Drive run smoothly.\u00a0 According to Mrs. Kruyer, The Varsity Club is the club that sponsors this event.\u00a0 Mrs. Kruyer explains that the members of the club, \u201chelp to organize, set-up, and work the blood drive.\u201d<\/p>\n

In order to donate blood one must meet a variety of requirements.\u00a0 Mrs. Kruyer states that one needs to be, \u201cat least sixteen years of age and in good health.\u201d\u00a0 In addition to the age and health requirements, a potential donors\u00a0 also needs to have certain height and weight requirements and they must also fill out papers in order to be evaluated if they are an eligible donor.<\/p>\n

Donors do not just sign up and wait for the event to take place.\u00a0 They must prepare for the event by doing a variety of things to assure that they will be healthy to donate blood.\u00a0 Mrs. Kruyer states that those who are planning on donating blood should, \u201cget at least eight hours of sleep the night before the donation.\u00a0 Eat a healthy breakfast or lunch- both if the appointment is later in the day.\u00a0 Drink a few extra glasses of water or fluids in the day before the donation.\u00a0 Remember, each donation saves 3 lives.\u201d<\/p>\n

There is a large variety of students signed up to donate blood.\u00a0 There are some students that are new to donating blood and others who are veteran donors.\u00a0 For seniors Angel Figueroa and Maria Rodriguez, sophomore Faith Hutchens, and junior Geoff Espich donating blood will be a new experience for them.
\nBeing new comers to donating, there can be some uncertainty as to what to expect.\u00a0 Hutchens says that the scariest thing for her is, \u201cknowing the risk of the things that could happen to you.\u00a0 Because you hear stories of how other people reacted to it and you are wondering how you will react to when you give blood.\u201d\u00a0 For Figueroa the scariest thing for him would have to be fainting.\u00a0 New donors are not the only ones that have fears for that day.\u00a0 Junior Cody Critchlow and senior Alejandra Renteria are afraid of the uncertainty of donating blood.\u00a0 For Renteria her uncertainty springs from, \u201chow long it is going to take because it is a little uncomfortable to have a needle in your arm.\u201d<\/p>\n

Whether they are fearful or not, each and every student that will participate in the blood drive has a special reason why he\/she donates.\u00a0 Senior Brandon Brashere explained that he is donating blood because, \u201cit is a good way to commit to charity that does not require money or a great amount of time on my part.\u201d\u00a0 Critchlow said that the reason why he is donating blood is because he knows, \u201csomebody out there needs it greatly so I am a proud downer.\u201d\u00a0 Saving someone\u2019s life is also a motivation to donate blood.\u00a0 Senior Brian Deacon says that saving a life is the main reason for donating blood.<\/p>\n

Students are preparing for the big day by properly preparing for the event before that day and the morning of the blood drive.\u00a0 Espich is preparing by, \u201ceating healthier and drinking more water.\u201d\u00a0 Like Espich, junior Michael Meyer is preparing for the big day with the exception that Meyer will, \u201cgo to sleep much earlier than,\u201d he normally does.<\/p>\n

The morning of the event also requires some sort of preparation on the student\u2019s part.\u00a0 Rodriguez will be preparing for her donation by, \u201ceat[ing] a good breakfast and drink[ing] water,\u201d the morning of the event since her donation is a little later on in the day.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Patricia Ortiz-Corona On April 11 Plymouth High School will be helping in saving lives by hosting its annual Blood Drive.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":178,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[41],"class_list":["post-6638","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-school-news","tag-april-2013"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/social.plymouth.k12.in.us\/perspective\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6638"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/social.plymouth.k12.in.us\/perspective\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/social.plymouth.k12.in.us\/perspective\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/social.plymouth.k12.in.us\/perspective\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/178"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/social.plymouth.k12.in.us\/perspective\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6638"}],"version-history":[{"count":16,"href":"https:\/\/social.plymouth.k12.in.us\/perspective\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6638\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8959,"href":"https:\/\/social.plymouth.k12.in.us\/perspective\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6638\/revisions\/8959"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/social.plymouth.k12.in.us\/perspective\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6638"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/social.plymouth.k12.in.us\/perspective\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6638"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/social.plymouth.k12.in.us\/perspective\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6638"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}