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Hailey’s Story

Making Organ Donation Part of School Curriculum.

It is the dream of Kidney Foundation volunteer and community advocate Hailey Cheema that the importance of organ donation be taught in all high schools in British Columbia. Organ Donation should be part of the curriculum, just like sex ed or the war on drugs is.  And anyone who has ever worked with Hailey knows, when she has a dream, it usually becomes a reality. 

According to Hailey, a fourth year SFU science undergrad, people who donate their organs are heroes. They save lives.

As a young person herself, Hailey knows that the future of successful organ donation rests within the hands of our youth.  What group of people is more susceptible to identifying with local heroes? And to new ideas?  Who better to start movements and bring about change than today’s youth? Armed with their social media platforms and desires to make a difference, our youth, the upcoming leaders in our community, are where the action is.

Once set on fire about the importance of organ donation, they will bring their enthusiasm home to ignite conversations in their homes, amongst their friends, and within the community. They will grab the pamphlets at the ICBC office when they’re getting their brand-new drivers’ licences. They will care. All they need is to be exposed to the subject.

And exposed they will be. The plan to get organ donation included in high school curricula started this past April with a change.org petition Hailey posted online asking people to sign up if they were in favour of having organ donation included in the high school curriculum.  Within 5 hours she had 100 signatures, and 14 days later, the list hit 550. This resulted in a call from Global TV’s Aaron McArthur who wanted to do a story about Hailey’s initiative, which led to an invitation from the Canadian National Transplant Research Program in Ontario to become a research partner. Since then Hailey has been in touch with the honorary Surrey City Counselor Mary Martin, a strong community advocate who said adding organ donation to the school’s curriculum “has to happen.”

The plan is to launch a pilot program in Surrey, the largest school district in the province. The curriculum material Hailey believes could be largely adapted from similar, successful programs happening in Ontario and the UK, and could include the concept of organ donation, conversations about the impact of organ donation and the barriers to consent, and worksheets and letters home to parents. The outcomes from this pilot could then be measured in a research project which would provide the right framework and information needed to roll the pilot out province-wide.  Hailey and the BC & Yukon Branch have already had initial discussions, including the opportunity to work together and possibly have this initiative form part of the Branch advocacy strategy.   

Hailey’s dedication to supporting the work of the Kidney Foundation started in honour of her late grandfather who died from kidney disease when she was 13. Since 2012 and in learning about the Kidney Foundation, she has worked tirelessly on many fronts to increase awareness of the importance of organ donation and encourage everyone to sign up. Her many achievements include participating in the Kidney Walks, raising over $15,000 in 3 years, hosting community conversations with the public about organ donation, approaching Victoria MLAs, including the MLA of New Westminster/Minister of Mental Health Judy Darcy, to add organ donation to their political platforms, participating as a Renal Ambassador at Royal Columbian Hospital and working as a nephrology research assistant on a project surrounding transplantation with Dr. Jag Gill, throughout both Fraser Health and Vancouver Coastal. Hailey is also the recipient of the 2017 Dr. Jack Uppal Community Service Award and the 2018 Faculty of Health Science Outstanding Community Service Award.

There is little doubt that Hailey Cheema’s dream of adding Organ Donation to the curriculum in all BC high schools will come to pass. 

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