Four Hopkinton High School students recently formed the Campaign for Anemia Research and Education (CARE), a youth-led organization dedicated to raising awareness about the dangers of anemia among the youth, specifically teenage girls.

CARE, formed in August, held a bake sale on Tuesday and will host another in the Hopkinton High School atrium on Thursday at 2:30 p.m. The group will donate all proceeds to Boston Children’s Hospital.

Juniors Devanshi Agrawal, Sofia Dhayal, Rithikaa Vigneshwaran, and Aishwarya Vijay founded CARE at the beginning of the school year for their Health Occupations Students of America (HOSA) community awareness project. HOSA provides leadership development, motivation, and recognition for students interested in health science and biomedical science programs

The goal of the HOSA project is “to raise awareness and resources for people suffering from health conditions,” Dhayal said. The group chose anemia as their health condition to raise awareness and resources due to their close relationship with it, Agrawal said.

Each of the four co-founders offered their own personal relationships with anemia. “We all have friends in our school — a mutual friend — who has anemia,” Agrawal said. “Watching her go through this was very important to us, and we realized that people like her struggle every day.”

Vijay added that some of her family members have iron deficiency anemia. Dhayal said she is iron deficient and experiences symptoms similar to those of anemia. “People often struggle to recognize the symptoms of anemia until they are diagnosed,” Dhayal said. “We just want to raise awareness of it because a lot of people have it, but they may not know yet.”

Over the summer, Vigneshwaran attended a program to learn about sickle cell anemia, which she said adds to her connection to CARE. The four juniors spent their first months learning about all aspects of anemia, creating presentations, and finding ways to spread awareness about the condition.

In January, they presented to eighth-grade students at Hopkinton Middle School about the risks, treatment, and other information regarding anemia. They have more presentations scheduled, as well as fundraisers and webinars to educate all ages.

“I think the response has been very positive,” Agrawal said. “We actually weren’t expecting the response to be so nice.” The group aims to expand their reach beyond the schools and hopes to educate residents from the surrounding towns of all ages.

Agrawal highlights CARE’s commitment to reaching underserved populations, emphasizing that these communities often lack the resources needed to understand and address anemia. The group credits much of their success to Mrs. Billeter, the advisor of the HOSA club, for being a “great asset” in and outside of the club.

Explore CARE’s Linktree to find presentations, GoFundMe pages for Boston Children’s and Brigham & Women’s Hospital, social media links, and information about their February 11th webinar.