Six young girls from West Windsor decided to raise funds for asthma patients and they recently presented a $300 check allocated to buy nebulizers for pediatric asthma patients to Princeton HealthCare System’s Foundation outpatient department.##M:[more]##
On a cold Saturday night this past February, Kimmy Cahill and Leigh Calotta, both 10 year-olds from West Windsor, got together for a winter sleepover party. During the evening they decided to raise the funds with the help of their friends, Kelly Cahill, 13; Katie Shuell, 13; Maggie Slonaker, 10; and Taylor Strype, 10, all of West Windsor.
“Leigh and Kimmy started it, but it really pulled together with everyone’s help,” says Shuell. Kelly Cahill added, “The project was really a group effort and it took everybody’s hard work to accomplish our goal.”
Deciding that a bake sale was the way to go, the girls put their plan into action, baking virtually all of the goods and selling them door-to-door and at area youth basketball games. All of the girls play basketball and their parents helped arrange for them to sell brownies, cupcakes, and cookies, during the playoffs at Millstone River School.
“Kelly initially wanted to donate the money to one of our schools, but after we talked about it we thought it would be better to donate it to the hospital,” said Kimmy Cahill.
“These girls are just lovely and their enthusiasm for doing something for other people is absolutely infectious,” says Margaret Lancefield, MD, PhD, medical director, outpatient clinic. “It’s a great, wonderful, spontaneous thing they did. To come up with such a fabulous idea and then follow through on it at their ages is just extraordinary.”
In addition, the girls donated several dozen books to the outpatient clinic’s pediatric unit. The girls plan on doing more fund-raising this summer. While they have not finalized a plan yet, they are confident that their next endeavor will be just as successful.
This fall, Kimmy Cahill, Calotta, Slonaker, and Strype will begin fourth grade at the Village School. Kelly Cahill and Shuell will start seventh grade at Community Middle School.
