On Tuesday, February 21, Roosevelt hosted their biannual American Red Cross blood drive. It was a successful event full of students and staff who wanted to help give back to their community and to people in need.

Students donating had to fill out an application and set an appointment when they went. They had multiple application stations and multiple blood donor beds for them to lay down on while they go through the procedure. Then they call students one by one to start the process. After they finish they sit down for a little bit, eat a snack, and drink juice before returning to class.

Although this was a successful blood drive, there have been others that had many more students who donated.

Roosevelt’s ASB Community Service Commissioner, Saisha Oberoi says, “Last blood drive I feel was better than this one, I feel like we lacked a little bit on the advertising because of the other things we had on our plates, but I still think we did pretty good.”

The American Red Cross collects 40% of the blood that is collected within the United States, and 25% of the blood collected comes from high school students. Every time that you donate blood you may save up to three lives. In order to donate blood you must be at least 17 years old, or 16 with parental consent.

Kimberly Bullinger, a Recruitment Developer with the American Red Cross, has been with them for about two years.

“Helping students give blood means everything to me,”  Bullinger said. She really does believe that giving blood can be life-changing to people in need.

At the event, there were two juniors who were giving blood, Kaden Ammara and Brooke Stewart, they share their opinions on what they felt and think about it.

“I kind of decided I wanted to give blood today, so it was last minute but I really like giving back,” Ammara said.

“I have enough blood and there is probably someone out there who needs it more than I do. It felt really good after because there is a possibility that I could help someone,” said Stewart.