https://events.lls.org/sc/scsoy22/tconquerin

Starting January 20th, Team Conquering Cancer started fundraising for the Leukemia Lymphoma Society. Consisting of a group of students from the AMHS Senior class, they have been planning fundraisers, sending letters, and meeting with sponsors. Running until March 11th, the team has seven weeks to raise as much money as possible for Leukemia Lymphoma Society. LLS is a foundation that helps foster awareness, advocacy, and funds against blood cancer. Since its founding, LLS has invested more than $1.2 billion (USD) in blood cancer research, funding almost all of the treatments that are currently being developed.

This journey started in the fall of 2021, when my brother and I were nominated to compete in the Student of the Year competition. We were inspired to compete by our family friend who battled acute lymphoblastic leukemia. Seeing her recover from this disease was an incredible feat of strength and a reminder that nothing is impossible. In addition, our grandmother recovered from thyroid lymphoma and we knew that we wanted to honor her.

After being a team member for Sophie Levenson in the 2021 competition, I took on the same team name and her legacy for the current competition. Francis Drake, who was also a team member for Sophie, joined the team for a second year. Francis chose to get involved with the Students of the Year campaign because she hopes to do her part in alleviating the financial strain that comes with accessing necessary healthcare. Disease is an equalizer; it has the penetrating ability to fall down upon any of us, and in the case of blood cancer, it is unusually common among children. Ensuring access to healthcare for anybody burdened with Leukemia, Lymphoma, Hodgkin’s Disease, Myeloma, or any enduring effects from these terrible conditions is our responsibility as a society– which inspired her participation in the campaign. Another team member, Mabry Wise, said “I hate cancer bc it’s stupid that we haven’t found a cure.” All of our team members agreed that we have all the resources available to find a cure, we simply need more advocacy and motivation. We truly believe that if we keep advocating and fundraising, we will be the generation to end blood cancer. If you would like to join the fight, please see the link below to our campaign. Together, we can conquer cancer.

https://events.lls.org/sc/scsoy22/tconquerin