With dawn still nearly two hours away, Robert Foshee’s student leadership class braved a windy early morning to stake out two corners near the campus of Fresno Christian. For the 11th year in a row, service on this morning meant an abbreviated night of sleep, a Starbucks run at 4 a.m. and yelling for donations until second period began at 9 a.m.

The reason? Kids Day 2012: a benefit for Children’s Hospital Central California.

This year marks the 25th anniversary of The Fresno Bee’s locally-supported Kids Day. Officially starting at 5:30 a.m., multiple schools, companies and organizations annually station themselves around the Fresno/Clovis area to sell a special edition of the newspaper for $1. A partnership between The Fresno Bee, KFSN ABC 30 and Children’s Hospital is responsible for making the event possible.

FC has been participating in Kids Day for the past 10 years. Bible teacher Robert Foshee led Student Leadership to the intersections of Cedar and Alluvial and Maple and Alluvial, arriving at 4 a.m. to claim the corners for the school.

Additionally, 23 members of The Feather staff co-operated with leadership in order to help peddle papers. According to Foshee, the opportunity to combine different groups allows the school theme to be active within the FC community.

“My favorite part about Kids Day is getting to help out the community and to join in with other groups to help Children’s Hospital,” Foshee said. “I also like combining Student Leadership with other groups on campus like journalism and like our theme, “We Are One,” to be able to do that on a fun project. I know the kids wake up really early, but they all enjoy it afterwards and say they would like to do it again.”

Each year campus students try to raise more money and sell more papers than last year and 2012 was no different. Despite the wind and cold, FC raised $300 more than last year by selling 875 papers; campus students collected a total of $1,605. Overall fundraising efforts helped the hospital raise over $450,000 as of March 7, according to the Children’s Hospital website.

The Fresno Bee on March 8, confirmed that over 5,000 community volunteers participated in the event and raised over $450,000.

For a more in-depth article on the 2012 Kids Day, check out Kids Day employs Fresno to assist Children’s Hospital (VIDEO).

For more information on how to become involved in campus service opportunities, contact Robert Foshee, leadership adviser.