Belpre Middle recipient of Red Cross award
By DAVE PAYNE Sr.
POSTED: March 28, 2008
PARKERSBURG — The Mid-Ohio Valley Chapter of the American Red Cross awarded its Sponsor of the Year award to Belpre Middle School during a Red Cross luncheon at the Murdoch Avenue Captain D’s Thursday.
Accepting the award on behalf of the school club were Samantha Davis and Justin Moody, both eighth-grade students. Both have been with the school’s club since it began four years ago.
Last year, the club collected nearly 200 pints of blood in its four blood drives and was the chapter’s sponsor of the month twice during 2007, said Brian Adams of the Red Cross. The club is sponsored by Karen Waller, Belpre Middle School guidance counselor.
“These kids are great. They are hard workers. Just look at how many students can donate. There aren’t many middle school students 17 years and over. They have to do twice or three times as much to get donors. There are some people at the school who can donate, teachers and other school employees, but to collect that much, they really have to work hard to get people out,” he said.
To get the blood donors to the school takes some work, Moody said.
“The Red Cross gives us a list of recent donors and we call them from the school in the evenings. We also have an e-mail list. Students from grades four through eight get donors from their families and we give them a prize for bringing in so many donors,” he said.
Volunteers from the school help set up for the blood drives,” Moody said.
“We have about 15 or 20 who always help out. If we have ice cream, we get about 30 volunteers,” he said.
This is Davis’ and Moody’s last year at Belpre Middle School. Moody said he hopes to start a Junior Red Cross chapter at Warren High School next year.
Davis said she has enjoyed her time with the program.
“I’ve really enjoyed it. I started back in fourth grade; it was a new program at that time. I’ve really enjoyed the people and got to do a lot of things. It’s been a lot of fun,” she said.
Adams said last month’s blood donations were above average.
“We did a really good job of collecting blood donations. I looked at last year and we increased donations for the month of February,” Adams said.
