HOSA’s trivia night has been an event for the past two years. They started it during COVID-19 because it was easy to do online while making money to support their fundraiser. This year, HOSA is fundraising for the Be the Match foundation since it is the national and international HOSA service project for the whole country. 

“We wanted to do something that would involve the community, but wouldn’t necessarily be your typical volunteer activity,” senior and HOSA president Aashna Ravi said. “We wanted it to be something that kids would enjoy but also get some kind of education about what the actual fundraiser is for.”

HOSA chose Be the Match because it’s their national service project this year. The national service project is the organization that all HOSA chapters across the nation support every year. This is the second year that HOSA as an organization is participating in the national service project. Be the Match is a bone marrow transplant organization that helps match donors with recipients, a critical job that requires funding to happen. 

“I am glad that we as an organization have been able to successfully hold the fundraiser, as we know that the money is changing lives,” Ravi said. “The money that we raise will go towards helping people join the donor registry which will allow individuals suffering from blood diseases and disorders to find their life-saving match.” 

HOSA wanted to make the trivia night fun, so they chose questions they knew students would be interested in, but at the same time would know the answers to. For example, they knew students would know the answer to the pop culture and movie questions, but not all of them would know the answers to the medical trivia questions. 

“We included the portion of medical trivia (like about bone marrow transplants) and questions about Be the Match to further bring awareness to the organization, and also since we are a medical organization it just made sense,” Ravi said. 

According to Ravi, HOSA would normally do blood drives as a form of fundraising getting the whole school involved for a good cause. This year, they haven’t been able to do the blood drives because of COVID-19 restrictions and district policies but they are hoping to bring those back soon. 

“One thing that I definitely want to see in the future for HOSA is to bring back our school-wide blood drives,” Ravi said. “It was a wonderful way to get people in the community involved in a life-saving donation! Additionally, we would love to bring in some more live speakers to future meetings.”

Wanting to have fun with her friends and help the community, senior Bella Fernandez chose to go to the trivia night as a fun way of earning community service hours. 

“I liked that there were a lot of people there and that I got to play trivia with my friends, which isn’t something I normally do,” Fernandez said. “I knew the most in the pop culture section because that’s something I see and hear about every day.”