St. Olaf students help wishes come true

St. Olaf School

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Courtesy of St. Olaf School

Everyone has a dream. But when you are a child with a terminal illness, that dream can seem impossible. The fourth-grade students of Saint Olaf Catholic School found a way to help some of these dreams come true.

Castle Tierney explained that while researching various programs for their class service program, they discovered the Make-A-Wish Foundation, which grants wishes to children with life threatening medical conditions.

Jackson Tillett said Katie Evans and Alexander Moffat contacted the local branch of Make-a-Wish and arranged for Paula Axelrod to pay a visit to Saint Olaf’s fourth-grade class to explain how it all works.

"We found there are three categories of wishes," Katie said. "To meet someone famous, go on a special trip, and to receive a special gift. Ms. Axelrod told them that a young girl named Allison was the first Make-A-Wish recipient to come to Utah, as her wish was to see snow."

The fourth-graders needed a wishing well for their project, and they were happily surprised when Chris Zedaker, husband of their teacher Jeriel, designed, built and delivered a beautiful wishing well so the students could paint and decorate it.

Valery Castillo and Sophia Davies explained that the class was divided into three groups. Each group was responsible for creating posters and presentations for all the classes in the school.

Students, teachers, parents and visitors dropped coins and cash into the wishing well during the month of November. Fina Doumbia and Bella Tingey echoed the sentiments of the class that doing this project made them feel good because they were helping someone who was ill in an effort to make them feel better.

The class collected $316, which will be used by the Make-A-Wish Foundation to buy and stock two backpacks for kids who soon will be going to Disney World for their wish.