Ash Grove students raise money for classmate battling brain tumor

Students at Ash Grove High School showed their support for eighth-grader Hayden Austin by raising funds for him during the school’s “Change for Change” Day on Friday, Nov. 19. As of press time, the fundraiser was found to have raised $1,500 for Hayden.
Kylie Moler, an English teacher at AGHS who helped organize the fundraiser, said the students chose to raise money for Hayden because he was found to have had a brain tumor last year.
“Last April, the day after his first dance, Hayden had a pounding headache that eventually sent him to the emergency room,” she said. “It was that day they found that Hayden had a tumor in the middle of his brain. Since that day, Hayden has been in and out the hospital undergoing chemotherapy and radiation in an attempt to shrink the tumor. Since his treatments are in St. Louis, our school wanted to help in the only way we knew how - by donating money to help with expenses.”
Change for Change Day is traditionally held every year on the Friday before the students get out for Thanksgiving break, and is a day when the middle-school students bring as much change as they can to their teachers. While the teachers are counting the change, the students get a fun day. The fun day lasts until the teachers finish counting the change, after which the students have to go back to class, thus motivating the kids to bring in as much money as they can.

High schoolers join in
What was different about this year’s Change for Change Day, Moler said, is that the high school students were invited to participate, as well. All of the students, with the exception of Hayden (“Somehow, we kept this a secret from him,” Moler said) were told that the money would be going to Hayden, and the students responded with an amazing amount of generosity.
“The beautiful thing about this year's event was that the kids showed their true character,” Moler said. “We were given $20 bills, checks written from parents, and a student even anonymously dropped a $100 bill in the change buckets. These students weren't donating money to get out of class anymore, or they would have brought change. They were bringing money to help out a fellow Pirate.”
Moler said they hoped to have the money to Hayden’s family by the end of this week.
The Change for Change Day is not the only fundraiser set up to benefit Hayden. A Go Fund Me page titled “Help offset medical bills for Hayden Austin” was set up last May; as of press time, it had raised $6,145 out of a $10,000 goal.