Mill Middle forms Kidney Walk team

Mill Middle School student Billy Gerken and teacher-advisor Holly Nichols stand next to the more than 125 cut-out kidneys sold to raise money for the National Kidney Foundation. Each was sold for $1.

Mill Middle School students are raising money for a worthy cause - the National Kidney Foundation.

Not only will the students participate in the annual Kidney Walk on June 10 at Dunn Tire Park in Buffalo, but they have held pre-event fundraisers to start the campaign. This is the first time the school has participated in the event.

The Student Leadership Committee decided to adopt the National Kidney Foundation and the Kidney Walk as its cause. They kicked off their fund-raising efforts with a pep rally on April 20 with featured speakers Barbara Breckenridge, executive director of the National Kidney Foundation and Una Banks. Both are kidney transplant recipients and they spoke about chronic kidney disease and organ transplantation.

For a week in April students sold kidney cut-outs for $1 and raised more than $125. Homerooms competed for the greatest number of sales, and Jennifer Marabella's homeroom won a breakfast for selling the most cut outs.

The next step was forming the Walk Team. To date, Team Mill Middle School has registered 15 to 20 members and has a fundraising goal of $500. Students have designed their own fundraising pages in order to invite family and friends to donate online.

The Student Leadership Committee decided to become involved because of their teacher advisor Holly Nichols, a technology specialist teacher who has been involved with the Kidney Walk Committee for many years. Seventh-grade students Billy Gerken and Juliette Shatkin of the Student Leadership Committee have run the campaign.

"After Ms. Nichols told us about kidney disease and what people go through who have it, we wanted to help," Gerken said.

For more information visit www. kidney. org.