Donating hair for breast cancer awareness

The Our Own English High School, Sharjah observed “Think Pink Day” on October 22.

The crowning glory was when the participating students became part of a hair donation drive. It was amazing to see 45 girls cut more than 10 inches of their hair to express solidarity for those with breast cancer. Their hair will be sent directly to Hair for Hope India, a community charity initiative based in the Subcontinent, which will then be converting the hair into wigs for cancer patients.

Pupils from grades 5 to 12 participated in a host of activities. A workshop was held for the school’s 70 female attendants. In this interactive session, two girls from Grade 12 shared their research on important information related to breast cancer and informed them of the need to do self examinations regularly.

This was followed by a workshop for senior pupils. I also got a chance to speak to the girls about my campaign, Protect Your Mom (PYM), and the need to create awareness about breast cancer so that we can protect our dear ones.

This campaign is probably the only one that has seen children as young as the age of eight participating in raising awareness about the issue.

The mothers of some of the pupils also joined in to learn more about breast cancer. Pupils participated in poster making contests and a writing competition. All the posters and songs will serve as entries for the design and win competition by the PYM. Any pupil can email their entries to pym20101@hotmail.com before November 10. All the information about the campaign is freely available at www.protectyourmom.asia.

The reader is a founder and CEO of Hair for Hope India and the Protect your Mom Campaign based in Dubai. Be a community reporter. Tell us what is happening in your community. Send us your videos and pictures at readers@gulfnews.com