To fulfill a patient’s last request, the Redlands Community College Academic Team held a drive collecting teddy bears to give to all Russell-Murray Hospice patients.
“Redlands has a close partnership with Russell-Murray Hospice, and when we learned a patient’s final wish was that all other patients would have a teddy bear to hug, we knew we wanted to help,” said Cherry Rain, coach of the Academic Team.
Each year, the team takes on a community service project, and the students chose to collect teddy bears to honor the patient as well as provide a gift to many other patients. They set a goal of 100 bears, and earlier this month, they delivered 180 bears to Russell-Murray Hospice.
“Russell-Murray Hospice provides such a wonderful service to the area, and I am so proud of our students for seeing a need and meeting that need,” said Juanita Krittenbrink, a member of both the Redlands Board of Regents and Russell-Murray Hospice Board.