Holliday High School students rally for Hondo sophomore
February 09, 2012
Students in North Texas rally for Hondo sophomore
By Diane Cosgrove
Anvil Herald Staff
The Student Council at Holliday High School in Holliday, TX, hosted a blood drive Wednesday to benefit Ryan Zaiontz. The 2A school is located about 15 minutes from Wichita Falls.
The school’s website carried this message to students and faculty, “This is a special blood drive, because we are designating our blood for a high school student in Hondo, TX. He has leukemia, and our donations will help lower his family’s medical expenses.”
Holliday HS teacher Susan Scarbrough said it all started with an email the ag teacher at Holliday HS, Jeff Miller, received from Hondo FFA regarding Zaiontz and the need for blood donations.
Scarbrough said she assisted student council members in organizing the drive. “The student council hosts usually four blood drives a year,” she said, “so this was a good opportunity for the kiddoes to know that it’s going someplace specific, that it benefits someone in particular.”
Zaiontz is a member of Hondo FFA and a sophomore at Hondo HS. Hondo FFA advisor and area coordinator Warren Beard said Wednesday, “Whenever we have something like that (a student with a specific need such as Zaiontz’), we broadcast it out to the other teachers (through the FFA coordinators) and just try to get the word out.
“FFA is a pretty tight-knit group,” Beard said, “even though we’ve got over 600,000 members in Texas. When something happens to one of them, everyone comes together.
“This is actually the third or fourth blood drive we’ve had,” Beard noted, since the word went out across the state. “We’ve been so swamped with emails and calls from other (FFA) chapters.” He added that blood drives have been held for Zaiontz at high schools in Marion and Ingram as well.
Fellow HHS ag teacher and FFA advisor Tim Tatsch confirmed a report the Anvil Herald had of another unselfish act of generosity, this one by Medina Valley Jr. FFA member Shayla McElroy. After winning a showmanship award at the Hondo FFA Prospect Show, she was presented her monetary prize, which she then gave to Tatsch, asking him to put it in the fund to help Zaiontz and his family with medical bills. Beard said that a collection jar had been set up at the concession stand during the December show.
Holliday’s blood drive netted 25 units. A total of 31 donors signed up to give at the event conducted by Texas Blood Institute of Wichita Falls. Scarbrough said many of the students who donated said they don’t ordinarily give blood, but decided to do so after hearing Zaiontz’ story.
