La Cañada High students, teachers say goodbye to their hair for cancer research
Tufts of hair fell like rain outside La Cañada High School’s North Gym last Thursday, as a group of students and teachers sacrificed their locks in a show of solidarity with young cancer patients for whom baldness isn’t an option.
For the second time in three years, students in the campus Bridge program and Associated Student Body collaborated with others to raise awareness and funds for the St. Baldrick’s Foundation, a Monrovia-based nonprofit that organizes similar head-shaving events nationwide to help fund cancer research.
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On Monday, Bridge adviser Gavin Williams happily reported this year’s efforts had raised more than $10,000, with incoming donations still being tallied.
“Three years ago, the students said they wanted to do something that brings the whole school together,” said a fuzz-headed Williams, who’d had his own dome chromed at a March 4 assembly introducing the fundraiser. “Throughout the last three weeks, everybody’s been donating in classrooms and talking about it.”
Williams said this year organizers instituted a “100 to shave/100 to save” structure to allow those too squeamish for a shaving to help the cause by raising enough to keep their hair intact. Among the 20 or more male students and teachers who opted for the former was junior Jake Stolmack.
“Hair is a small sacrifice to make to raise awareness about something like cancer,” the 16-year-old reasoned. “Honestly, even the hair on our heads is something we take for granted.”
Bridge student Avani Johnson, 16, helped collect the pledge sheets and in-class donations on the day of the event. She said that while no female students participated in this year’s shearing, several donated tresses to the nonprofit Locks of Love and Pantene’s Beautiful Lengths program, which harvest real hair for the manufacture of wigs for cancer patients.
“It’s actually really cool to see how involved students have become,” the junior said. “To see students take money out of their own pockets without being asked to — it’s very heartwarming.”
The St. Baldrick’s Foundation, headquartered in Monrovia, raised nearly $37 million last year to help fund pediatric cancer research, partly through events similar to the one held at LCHS. The foundation estimates about 175,000 children nationwide are diagnosed with cancer each year.
That sad fact is part of why junior Armand Manoukian, 17, insisted on sitting in the barber’s chair this year, despite his parents’ protests.
“My parents didn’t want me to do it. I’ve had the same haircut since the day I was born,” he said. “(But) I’ve had family members touched by cancer, so I wanted to do this.”
Principal Ian McFeat, who submitted to the proverbial blade, said afterward the event demonstrates how much teachers, students and staff care about doing things for the benefit of others.
“Really, just the ability to give back is a huge, huge thing,” he said. “Bigger than hair.”
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Sara Cardine, sara.cardine@latimes.com
Twitter: @SaraCardine
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