With Friday April 7 being a holiday leading into the Easter break, LPSD schools in Lloydminster will be wearing green shirts on Thursday to support organ donation.
It’s the fifth year since the Humboldt Broncos tragedy that took the lives of several members of the Saskatchewan hockey team, but in the wake of the tragedy came what has been described as the Logan Boulet effect. The player being an organ donor was able to give his organs and save the lives of countless others and at the same time foster an uptake in people signing up to donate their organs when they pass away.
Director of education with the Lloydminster Public School Division Jason Neville knew Logan Boulet personally. Boulet was a third-year Bronco and Neville was the assistant general manager.
Neville points out that Logan’s parents have kept up his legacy and helped us to recall his sacrifice.
“How they’ve created this day and raising awareness. And a lot of the facts – I wasn’t aware that only 30-something per cent of Canadians are organ donors. So it’s just me trying to help carry on the Logan Boulet effect.”
There are over 4300 Canadians on the organ transplant list right now awaiting an organ. When polled eight out of 10 Canadians say they would donate their organs, but in fact less than 35 per cent have signed up.
Neville says he got to know Boulet quite well through his work with the twenty-year old players who were looking to the next level after junior hockey. He says Boulet became an organ donor after his coach and mentor Ric Suggitt who was also an organ donor had passed away.
With those reasons in focus, the education director says their schools will be involved on Thursday.
“We have asked schools to participate and share it with their families – for students and staff to wear a green shirt if they can on Thursday. And at the main office here, we have put it out to our staff as well.”
Meantime, the local representatives of the Canadian Transplant Association are inviting the community to light up neighbourhoods in green on April 7 for Green Shirt Day.
They add residents can show support for organ donation by turning their front door light green, stringing green lights, or displaying a yard sign in support of the lifesaving cause.
Thursday April 6 marks five-years since the Humboldt Broncos tragedy. Logan Boulet passed away on April 7 and his organs were subsequently donated in the life giving procedure. Of the 29 passengers who were on the bus on that fateful day in 2018, 16 passed away and 13 are carrying physical and emotional scars for the rest of their lives.