Last Saturday night, 18 teams slept over at the turf to honor cancer survivors and raise money for cancer research. Liz Miller, a science teacher at the Florence Sawyer School, organized this year’s relay.

The relay event started on Friday, June 1st, when all Nashoba students filed out onto the turf to help with fundraising for Relay for Life. Each student donated a dollar to their C period class and by the end of the day, the school had raised a total of $645. Nashoba staff members would like to thank Pete Connery and his department for helping run the Mini Relay here at Nashoba, and Tania Rich for helping coordinate everything on the turf.

The official relay, taking place that Saturday night, consisted of a series of events and activities for the teams. For Carly Henderson, a freshman at Nashoba, most of the night was spent walking with her group and exploring the different stations lining the track. She also explained the luminaria ceremony that happened later in the night. “They gave us all glow sticks,” she recalled, “and the leader, Mrs. Miller, had us crack it and stand up as a representation of a person we may have lost to cancer or currently battling cancer.” Participants then took a silent lap around the track in the dark to remember those lost and those fighting cancer. The luminaria ceremony tends to be one of the most emotional moments of the night.

One of the teaches here at Nashoba, Ms. Jankun, explained how she participated in the Relay for all four years of her high school career and is now on the ELT board as a Youth Liaison. She told Chieftain Press reporters that by the end of the night, they had raised about $69,000 in entirety. “This year was the top-grossing year for Nashoba Relay for Life,” she said. “All the money will be donated to American Cancer Society. The majority of the donations go to cancer research, patient support, etc.”

There also were some people who fundraised and donated a very generous amount. The top three fundraiser participants included Chris Barrett, who raised $8,000, Kerry Oblak, who raised $1,528, and Holly Senior, who raised $1,300.

All in all, Nashoba exceed expectations when it came to Relay for Life this year. Every team did astonishing, the night was entertaining, and it was all for a great cause.