On March 6, Pascack Valley’s Executive Council held its first blood drive since 2019,  though the event occurred annually before the pandemic.

“We have a whole building [of students] that’s never experienced it,” Executive Council Advisor Shawn Buchanan said. “It’s always been a tradition; every year everyone knows about the blood drive. It’s great because everyone looks forward to it. We now have a whole building that has no idea about the blood drive.”

According to Buchanan, the Blood Drive has been a Pascack Valley High School tradition for over 20 years; former teacher and Executive Council Advisor Karen Kosch ran it for many years prior to him.

“We haven’t had it since before COVID, and it’s something that we always did as a tradition,” Executive President Evan Scalia said. “Hopefully, this year I can start by building the tradition back up and getting it back to what it once was.”

Many council members helped out in different ways; Scalia described his role as more “behind the scenes” than anything else.

 Executive Vice President Treshan Nilaweera explained his involvement. “I’m making sure that everybody knows to stay here twenty minutes, and that they aren’t leaving too early, and make sure that they eat and drink so they don’t faint,” Nilaweera said.

Student EMTs such as Morgan Jones volunteered as well; Jones said she did so because she wanted to help her community. 

“Today I participated in the Blood Drive and helped alongside the nurses and student council,” Jones said. “I escorted high school students to the recovery station after donating blood. I also supported some high school students who were a little uneasy or nervous. I also helped out students by giving them water and snacks.”

Jones says that the donating participants are “saving a life and they don’t even know it.”

“It’s really important for the local hospitals, as local medical facilities help them tremendously each year,” Buchanan said. “Sadly, there are always blood shortages for different medical procedures, and we like to do our part as much as we can. We’ve been doing it for over 20 years. We grew it [the blood drive] in the pre-COVID years, and we were the largest blood drive in North Jersey. We take a lot of pride in that we do so much for our local community.”

Buchanan said that in previous years the Blood Drive had around 200 donors. Due to staffing at the blood bank, they had to cap it at 120 spots this year, but PV filled every single spot.

“We’re just excited to be back,” Buchanan said. “We’re excited to have it [the drive] back in our building and to be a part of it and help the community in a small way that we can. It’s something that we look forward to every single year, and we’re happy that the students are now able to experience it.”