Blood Cancer United is a nonprofit dedicated to helping blood cancer research. They work to support patients who are struggling, those witnessing the ones struggling, and work to make a change in the suffering of many around the world. Last school year, junior Riley Kesel witnessed her brother, Nolan Kesel, battle cancer, and her life was forever impacted.
“When my brother was diagnosed with cancer he was selected to be the honorary hero for the campaign last year, and so when I went to the grand finale, I wanted to be involved because I saw how nice it was,” Riley said. “I saw how happy it made him, he had a lot of fun, and without Blood Cancer United and all the fun things they did throughout my brother’s treatment he wouldn’t be in the place that he is now.”
After Nolan recovered and Riley learned what Blood Cancer United could do, she learned about the student visionary program that the nonprofit offered to those who wanted to be part of something great. The program was a seven week long campaign offered to high school leaders, to help raise awareness and funds to help cure all types of blood cancers.
“I heard about it through the posters at school, because she was hanging them up at a lot of convenient locations, so I just saw one and was like, ‘I know her, let me reach out’,” junior Isabelle Demoss said. “I found out it was for a good cause and I knew her personally because I had a class with her, so I was like, ‘why not?’”
With her reach, Riley got other girls to join her campaign, named “Strong Like 23” in honor of her brother’s baseball number. Soon meetings were being held and involvement grew.
“At meetings we talk about donations we have gotten, people and companies we can email to help us raise money and give big donations, we talk about fundraising events that we have coming up to help boost the program,” junior Anna Archibald said. “Riley is great at making them not like a meeting vibe, if they’re at Panera, or if they’re at her house, it’s always a very fun atmosphere.”
So far the group has raised over $8,000 and that number continues to grow every week. Through their engagements with their families, places and events, this money will all successfully be used to continue improving research, which over the years has spread all over St. Louis and continued its outreach.
“There’s even a moment where we go and visit some of the labs at WashU that are working on cancer research, kind of as an example of where our money that we raised could be going,” junior Arianna Dangi said.
Though a very important process, when Riley is around her team, the fun never stops. The girls working together on this campaign have not only become part of an everlasting impact, but also made memories that are forever.
“Our first event was a Top Golf introductory event, where we all got to go, hear from the honorary hero this year, (4 year old, Claire) they did a presentation, announced all the other groups, talked about what school they were from, and we got to play top golf of course,” Dangi said. “It was fun to hear from other people who had the same goals as us, who wanted to give back to the community and really just help out others.”
Riley is proud of her team’s accomplishments and their involvement in something that she found to mean as much to those in her community as it does to her.
“From the beginning I knew this campaign was very much not a one person job,” Riley said. “I was really nervous that we weren’t going to raise any money but it obviously has proven me wrong, and we still have four weeks left so I’m excited to see where it goes.”
