Sequoyah Elementary Students Raise Donations for The American Heart Association

Chris Howell NewsOn6.com

TULSA---Stacey Eby is a 5^th grade teacher at Sequoyah Elementary School in Tulsa. When her son Grant was born three years ago with two defects in his heart, the students and staff rallied to raise both money for the American Heart Association and awareness of congenital heart defects.

    At only two months of age Grant had an open heart operation to repair the damage and is now a healthy three-year-old. Today the students at Sequoyah had their third annual heart walk, raising over two hundred dollars for the American Heart Association by bringing in donations and walking on the sidewalks around the school. Grant was also on hand today lending his own form of moral support for the walkers.

‘For our kids it's a big deal because they don't have that much,' said Stacey, ‘to be able to give to a cause that they know is helping someone is a pretty amazing feeling for them.'

The American Heart Association invested more than $543 million dollars in the 2006-2006 fiscal year, for research and education of the defects and diseases that claim over 910,000 American lives per year.