By KELSEY UNRUH

Staff writer

Many high school students are involved in after school activities— such as sports or theater— but one has donated her time to helping others.

Hillsboro High School student Ellian Weisbeck has been part of an American Red Cross scholarship program called Leaders Save Lives, which helps high school and college students conduct blood drives.

“I didn’t know it was really a thing,” Ellian said. “I knew I could donate, so it was nice to help and donate this year.”

Ellian’s aunt, Staci Silhan, who runs blood drives around the Hillsboro area, found out about the program and mentioned it to her niece.

Ellian’s responsibilities included signing people up and getting new donors.

“At the blood drive, I started by helping get the food ready and setting up everything,” Ellian said, “and then once it got going, I helped check people in and gave them food.”

Ellian said that she was used to serving people, but that helping people at the drive was a different experience.

“I just really didn’t know what all went on behind the scenes,” she said. “Getting to see what all the workers did, and how fast they did it, and how they used their time to do that, I didn’t really know how they did all that, so that was pretty cool.”

Ellian donated not only her time to the drive, but also blood.

“It wasn’t hard at all,” Ellian said. “I thought it might hurt a bit, but it didn’t.”

One thing she noticed was the generosity of people and how much they cared about the cause.

“It really stood out to me how upset people got when they couldn’t donate,” Ellian said. “I thought that was interesting cause they really did want to help, and a lot were so sad they were almost to the point of tears.”

Ellian hopes to help with more drives in the future.