Wissahickon High School Students Raise 30K at First Annual Mini-THON Event

Wissahickon High School students raised $30,091 at the first annual Mini-THON event on Friday, November 9. More than 200 students turned out to participate in activities: pie-eating contest, half-court shooting contest, tug-of war, ping pong, hair cutting/hair shaving, raffles and upbeat dancing. Families, faculty and community members were invited to the event during the community hour. Two families shared stories of their children battling pediatric cancer and led the attendees on a luminary walk to honor those impacted.

Seniors AnnaBelle Kline, Owen Baim and Rebecca Dolfman organized this event as their graduation project under the direction of faculty advisors, Jeff Slanina and Stephanie Leister.  The seniors’ initial goal was to raise $12,000 and they more than doubled it. They recruited a team of 50 students to help them fund raise, plan, and execute this event. Since January, the team had canning fundraisers, set up an online funding web page, held dine and donate nights at Chipotle, and organized a high school powder puff football game to collect donations. All the proceeds are donated to the Four Diamonds Fund to raise awareness of childhood cancer. “We’re proud to start this amazing tradition at Wissahickon High School,” said AnnaBelle Kline.