FCCLA students Braelyn Crowe and Clair McGuire collected items at Kroger to give to nurses.
Students with the Mason County High School Family, Career and Community Leaders of America are collecting items to show their appreciation for nurses and staff at Meadowview Regional Medical Center.
Shannon Roberts, advisor for FCCLA, said her students wanted to show frontline workers how much they were appreciated for their fight against COVID-19.
One student, Claire McGuire, a 10th grader at MCHS, said she recently read an article about how nurses feel underappreciated and are considering leaving the field. It was part of what made her want to help.
“We really want to show our healthcare workers that we appreciate them,” she said. “We’ve worked to gather donations of different types of items to put into baskets that will be dropped off at the high school.”
Braelyn Crowe, an MCHS 10th grader, said the students recently stood inside the cart area of Kroger in Maysville in order to collect donations.
“It was cold and snowing, so we stood inside where people would get their carts. At first, people thought we were just handing out masks. So, we actually went inside and grabbed some masks to hand out to people and it gave us the perfect opportunity to talk to them about what we were doing,” she said.
According to Crowe, while handing out the masks, the two students also handed out flyers with information about what they were collecting. Shoppers could take the flyer in, purchase the items and return them to the students as a donation.
Some of the items they were collecting included hand sanitizer, lotions, lip balms, hair ties, pre-packaged foods and water bottles.
“We also asked an elementary school teacher to help out and she did,” McGuire said. “There are students in Straub who are writing thank-you notes to nurses and we’ll include those in the baskets.”
Roberts said the students have also created a thank-you promotion to run on the radio that tells frontline workers how much they are appreciated.
The students will continue to collect donations until Tuesday. Anyone interested in donating items can drop them off in a box located in the front office of the high school.
The items will be delivered to the hospital on Wednesday.
