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Alicia Drier had tears running down her cheeks as an electric razor stripped red curly locks from her head Friday afternoon at Concordia Lutheran High School.
About 30 Concordia High School students and faculty members participated in the second annual shearing for a good cause. Money raised – along with the hair – goes to the St. Baldrick Foundation, a nonprofit which works to fight childhood cancer.
Drier, a teacher at Concordia Lutheran, was able to raise $300 by volunteering to shave her head. Last year, students were able to raise $8,000. Student organizer Allison McConnell, a 16-year-old sophomore, said their goal is $10,000 for this year.
As students and faculty members took the stage in the auditorium, they told the gathered student body just why they were making the sacrifice. Most had been touched by a family member who was either deceased or battling cancer. Some were closer to home than others, with wives, grandparents, cousins, brothers, sisters and friends among those noted.
Aleigha Sweet, 10, there to help out, is four years removed from battling her own cancer. Her father recalled Aleigha began the battle at age 4. Now she will do anything to help out the St. Baldrick foundation, which helped her when she was ill.
“Miracles do happen,” Tom Sweet, her father, said.
Sweet said parents have to be positive when they are around their child to give them a hopeful outlook to battle the disease.
“You just have to believe,” Sweet said.
Aleigha Sweet's hair is now just long enough to get into pigtails that reached her shoulders, but Friday she offered it up, along with the other student and faculty members.
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