On Tuesday, March 2, Shorewood High School hosted their third blood drive for the 2021-22 school year.

In a typical school year, the Student Council organizes two blood drives for students and the community. This year, due to Covid-19 and the national blood shortage, there have been a total of three. 

“[This time] we had 55 volunteers overall that donated but some people do get deferred. So, overall, we had 49 successful blood donations,” said Rose Schnorr, sophomore class president. 

Many methods were used to reach potential donors, including announcements, posters, and emails.

“I also think just having an easy QR code to scan or a link that students can easily sign up for is the biggest thing,” said Mariana Shaffer, senior and head coordinator for the blood drive.

In addition to advertising for the blood drive, many students in Student Council volunteered to help with it day-of.

“I think the best part about it is that it’s run by a lot of student volunteers,” said Schnorr. “We get a lot of students engaged with it and we get a lot of students who donate.”

According to Giselle Knox, sophomore and volunteer at the drive, the students’ efforts paid off.

“When I was there, there was always someone donating blood and there was always a decent amount of people waiting to donate, so I think it was a success,” Knox said.

Participants in the blood drive generally receive free food provided by local businesses. They also get the chance to help others and possibly save lives.

“I’m sure you’ve seen that with just one donation, you can save up to three lives, and if you look at some of the stories, just one person donating blood can save someone in a life-changing surgery,” Schnorr said.

Knox appreciates that the drive is open to community members, as it gives them a chance to donate as well. During the drive, about two-thirds of the donations came from students and one-third from community members.

“[People] don’t usually have time in their day and this is just an allotted amount of time where [they] can just come in and do that,” Knox said.

Schnorr is happy to see both students and community members coming together to help others. 

“This isn’t just a Shorewood high school thing, it’s a Shorewood thing, and you have people come back to donate because they know it makes a difference,” Schnorr said.

Overall, the event provides a simple way for people to make a big difference.

“My favorite part of the event was knowing that I made a change and that just by doing something so simple and small,” said Knox, “I helped another person or even potentially saved another person’s life.”