Laila White is a junior from Upper Marlboro, Maryland attending The Madeira School in McLean, Virginia. Her family consist of her mother, father, older sister, nephew, and adorable Yorkshire Terrier named “Trooper”. Laila has been so passionate about helping others in her community since she was very young, she wanted to tackle the challenge of raising thousands of dollars for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society (LLS). When she is not helping LLS, you can find Laila either on the dance floor, in student government, or on a bike ride. In addition to being on the varsity dance team, Laila is a member of GirlUp, the Sexual Assault and Consent club, Global Politics and Culture club, the Model UN club, and the Black Student Union just to name a few. In the future, Laila aspires to be a civil rights attorney or a juvenile attorney as one way of continuing her love of helping people. She is excited to continue the legacy of Team Fire Heart, a group consisting of Madeira students and the winners of the Students of The Year campaign in 2019. 

Team Snails Racing for a Cure is a group of seven strong and powerful girls. Laila White and Caroline Cassidy are the candidates leading a team of five young women; Alison Buckler, Olivia Carnot, Katherine Moe, Rachel Rhee-Feitel, and Reese Villella. Team Snails Racing for a Cure decided on this interesting name because of The Madeira School mascot is a snail. Snails may be slow, but slow and steady wins the race! Madeira's goal is to launch women who change the world and these young women want to fully embody this statement. 

Team Snails Racing for a Cure has chosen to honor Sydney Belsher throughout our entire campaign. We first heard about Sydney's story through our guidance counselor Mrs. Belsher. On April 26, 2014, the Belsher family received news that Sydney Belsher, their youngest daughter was diagnosed with Infantile B-Cell Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia at the age of 6 months. This was a very hard time for the family trying to balance work, taking care of their two other daughters, and helping Sydney. After a very rough battle of having gone through chemotherapy, moving to Ohio for treatments, and being told Sydney has a 35-40% chance of surviving until the age of 5, Sydney beat cancer! Team Snails Racing for a Cure wanted to acknowledge and honor Sydney for all the trials and tribulations she has had to endure while only being 6 years old #Super Sydney!

Read more about Sydney and her family here:

https://www.beyoutifulfoundation.com/stories/cancer-is-a-family-affair/ 

Welcome To My Fundraising Page!

I am honored to be participating in The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society’s (LLS) 2020 Students of the Year (SOY) campaign, a seven-week initiative in which high school students from around the country are nominated to participate in a fundraising competition to benefit LLS’s mission: to find a cure for leukemia, lymphoma, Hodgkin’s disease and myeloma, and to improve the quality of life of patients and their families.

I am raising funds in honor of those who are currently battling or are in remission from a blood cancer. Each dollar is a vote and the team that raises the most money at the end of the seven weeks is named Students of the Year. As a team, our mission is to not only raise the most money but also to bring attention to blood cancers like leukemia, which is the most common form of cancer in children and teens.

We are changing the face of blood cancer! Will you join us?!

Because of campaigns like Students of the Year, LLS has seen tremendous success discovering new and more effective treatments for blood cancer patients and has created a new exciting initiative focusing on treatments for pediatric patients.

• LLS funded 43 of the 49 FDA approved treatments for blood cancer patients since 2017
• Since 2000, more than 40% of the new cancer therapies approved by the FDA started as blood cancer research
• In 2019, LLS established The LLS Children’s Initiative, a comprehensive $50 MILLION multi-year endeavor, to help children with cancer through every facet of LLS’s mission:
  • More than doubling our investment in pediatric cancer research grants
  • Expanding education and support service for children and their families
  • Advocating for and driving policies to accelerate the development of new treatments and break down barriers to care
  • Launching LLS PedAL (Pediatric Acute Leukemia), a groundbreaking global precision medicine clinical trial in acute pediatric leukemia

And many LLS supported therapies not only help blood cancer patients but are now used to treat patients with rare forms of stomach and skin cancers. They're even being tested in clinical trials for patients with a range of cancers including lung, brain, breast, pancreatic and prostate cancers. LLS funded drugs are now being tested for patients with other non-cancerous diseases like Diabetes, Rheumatoid Arthritis and Multiple Sclerosis.

Please join me in supporting my campaign and LLS by making a donation to my fundraising campaign. Thanks to your support, my efforts, will help fund the therapies and treatments and help save lives today.

LLS's continued advancements over the years, are responsible for the blood cancer survival rate doubling and tripling; in some cases, the survival rate has even quadrupled.

All donations are greatly appreciated and are tax deductible. With your donation, you’re not only support LLS research but patient services, advocacy, public and professional education, and community services as well. Together WE CAN FIND A CURE!

Please visit my fundraising webpage(s) often and pass along the link to family, friends, neighbors, colleagues, etc. who might donate!  I recognize I need lots of support to reach my fundraising goal!

On behalf of blood cancer patients everywhere I thank you for your support!

For more information about LLS, please visit www.lls.org