The school buzzed about Coins for Carson. There were posters, emails and people parading festive posters outside the school during carpool.

Coins for Carson is an annual fundraising event that the St. Jude Club runs in order to raise money to donate to St. Jude. Students from each campus are asked to donate any coins or loose change they have to the cause.

Many students were happy to give their change to the cause for many reasons. Some students, like junior Olivia Barton, donated because they had family ties.

“I decided to donate because I was family friends with Carson Head,” Barton said.

Coins for Carson was created in honor of Carson Head, a young child and St. George’s student who lost her battle with cancer. Head’s goal was to donate her piggy bank to St. Jude in order to help the families there and encourage everyone to do the same. The tradition began at the lower school campuses where the students would make piggy banks then raise money throughout the month of November. Later on, the upper school campus joined.

Avery Whitehead is the president of the St. Jude Club and was a leader of the fundraiser, along with senior Kneeland Gammill and sophomore Mary Miller Goldberg.

“I am one of the leaders of the St. Jude Club, so I helped organize and run this event,” Whitehead said. “Personally, I believe this is a great cause and it’s not a hard thing to donate to because mostly everyone has some spare change lying around. That’s all it takes.”

Whitehead was a hardcore advocate for this cause and was very excited for the counting ceremony at the lower school campuses, which happened on Dec. 1.

“All the kids take their piggy banks up one by one and put them on the stage. We have some people from our club going to put our pig up on stage too,” Whitehead said. “A bank does it for us every year, so we should know the final amount in a few weeks.”

Junior Margo Valadie supports the coin drive and believes it’s able to help St. Jude and its patients.

“With enough change, we can make a change,” Valadie said.