On Thursday, December 7, students coming to school wearing their pjs had a deeper meaning, to help children at CCMC who are fighting for their lives.
Interact advisor, Mrs. Lindsay McGinn, was able to organize an event for South Windsor students to wear pjs and raise money for the Connecticut Children’s Hospital.
“We thought it would be a really fun opportunity to try to increase school spirit and get kids into a competitive spirit,” said organizer of the event, Mrs. McGinn. McGinn helped make this fundraising event a competition between homerooms and grade levels to see who has the most pj spirit. Homerooms were encouraged to participate with the prospect of receiving a pizza party and teachers were enticed with the opportunity to have a duty period covered.
The winning homerooms were announced on Friday, December 8th. Coming in first was Mrs. Swan’s 10th grade homeroom with 60 Points. Second place was Mrs. Ruiz’s 11th grade homeroom with 34 points. Next up was Mrs. Kelsey’s 12th grade homeroom, racking it up with 30.5 points. And finally, Mr. Gilroy’s 9th grade homeroom brought in 28.5 points. It was exciting to see how many people participated and had fun while raising money for a good cause.
SWHS was able to raise over $600 dollars, which is amazing considering this is the first year the school made it a competition. Since the donations go to such an important cause, Interact is already planning to do this every year, hoping to raise even more money.
“The main goal is to fight childhood cancer,” Mrs. McGinn told The Prowl.
There are 1.9 million children who have been diagnosed with cancer in the U.S.
Since the start of pj day in 2011, more than 2.7 million dollars has been raised to support children battling cancer according to Connecticut Children’s foundation. In 2022 alone, $665,000 was raised to combat children’s cancer.
People might be asking themselves why pjs? The reason for it is because pjs are the unofficial uniform of children in hospitals undergoing treatments and fighting for their lives. Thus, people all over the state are showing children that they aren’t alone when they wear them.
School administration is considering make this event an annual tradition every 7th of December. So, the next time anyone puts on pjs, just know that it helps put a smile on a child’s face.
