Over the past couple weeks STAP Comm has been holding its annual Adopt-a-Family Fundraiser. And this year, the Orchard Park High School community has not been as diligent in donating money as past years.
The Adopt-a-Family fundraiser is through Roswell. Organizations like schools and businesses can choose to adopt a family who has been affected by cancer. Individuals can also participate in this fundraiser. This year the Orchard Park community has adopted a family of six who has been affected by cancer.
Donating is super important when it comes to schools and organizations participating in this event. Reese Politowski, a STAP extension officer, explains how the fundraiser works: “Once you donate, we go and buy gift cards for the family and then donate the gift cards to Roswell. We have a list from the family of what they could use, so we have an idea of what gift cards to buy.” The gift cards purchased help take some financial burden off of families who are affected by cancer.
Over the last couple of years this fundraiser has been a huge success. Most years STAP Comm ends up adopting an additional family due to the surplus of donations. This year the Orchard Park High School community has fallen behind. “For the past 3 years, we’ve gone up 200 dollars each year. In 2020 we raised about $2400; 2021- $2600; and 2022-$2800. We have not finished counting, but this year we only have about $600,” says Reese Politowski.
There may be a reason for the difficulty gathering donations this year: “Our homeroom time has gone down, so it’s hard to make time to speak in homerooms and make students aware of the fundraiser. Nobody knows what we’re doing.” STAP Comm is working on making revisions to help make fundraising more accessible.
According to Mr. Bove, STAP Comm co-adviser, though collecting about $500 less than is typical, the effort did pretty well, ultimately raising around $2400 for the cause. Despite the succes, the slow start has STAP Comm researching ways to make the effort more efficient and to increase student donations.
STAP Comm worked on further fundraising December 11 through Panera, where a percentage of the proceeds helped benefit Winter Homecoming and other upcoming events.