By LILY APPLEBEE

Featured Image: A digital design featuring a hospital bed with heart balloons tied to the end of it. In the background are many beautiful hearts, and the title gives a simple description of the article: “CV Jr. Volunteers at Redlands Hospital.” (LILY APPLEBEE/Birdbox Image)

On Valentine’s Day, the Citrus Valley Jr. Volunteers (who are also Red Cross club members) distributed heart shaped balloons and Valentine’s Day cards to patients at the Redlands Community Hospital. The hospital has always been dedicated to helping the community through even the worst of times, so it’s nice to see some of that love be reciprocated. 

The hospital doesn’t actually plan this sort of event, unlike most may think. In fact, how this happens is through the student volunteers. Students at CV can collect hours by volunteering at the hospital, earning them some credit as well as opportunities for learning more about the medical field. While there are no hands-on experiences during volunteering, the staff are always there to answer questions for those with a passion for medicine.

The Red Cross club also plays a hand in this, particularly in making the cards and distributing them, whether that be by hand, balloon or meal tray. Red Cross meets every other Wednesday in B-15 (Ms. Libaos). The club focuses on expanding members’ knowledge about opportunities in the medical field by providing slides with information about the many careers. One such slide was about the job of being a physical therapist, and the club even got a guest speaker who is a physical therapist to come and speak to them a few weeks back. 

Making these cards is something they do for community service hours. They’ve done winter cards for Redlands Community Hospital in the past, and so the making of Valentine’s cards was bound to happen. Huge thank you to Red Cross club president, Meera Patel, for talking to me about the club and giving some more details about the Valentine’s Day card and balloon surprise. It was great getting to talk to you and learn more.

Featured Image: A photograph of the sign lining the entry way of the Redlands Community Hospital. (LILY APPLEBEE/Birdbox Image).

If you want to see photos of this wonderful surprise, you can look at the hospital’s Instagram account known as “redlands_community_hospital” or simply search up their name. If you want to know more about CV’s Red Cross club, their Instagram is “cvhs.redcrossclub“ and to join the google classroom, the code is: “lltyihnm.”

Happy belated Valentine’s Day!