This Wednesday during Collaborative time, over a hundred seniors gathered at the front of Door 7 at Edina High School along with the Edina Fire Department to participate in the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge.

“The weather was very cloudy, and it was very cold,” said senior Logan Hansen.

According to ALS.org, the viral challenge is an activity in which participants get dumped on by cold water, and nominate others in order to raise money and awareness for the disease. ALS, otherwise known as Lou Gehrig’s disease or Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis, is a neurodegenerative disease that affects motor neurons in the body and causes rapidly progressive weakness due to muscle weakening.

However, the reasoning behind this impactful event was not just for the excitement. “It’s for a good cause,” said EHS Principal Dr. Bruce Locklear. “So many people are impacted by ALS. Most importantly we just wanted people to understand it was much larger than ice being dumped on someone’s head.”

Not only did this event affect the student body at EHS, but many members of the Edina community as well. “We have a staff member whose aunt suffered from this and passed away,” Locklear said. “Ironically, we received 2 or 3 calls from the community about how they have struggled with this either personally or through extended family.”

The event also allowed seniors to leave their legacy at the high school. Five dollars were donated for every senior that showed up, and it gave a good reason for the school and the community to come together for a common good. “I wanted my senior year to [start] with a bang, and this was a great way to do it,” said Hansen.

Within less than a minute, all the participants were sprayed with the fire hose before going back inside to warm up, but not before nominating another school to do the same. “We chose Rosemount because we’re playing them for our Homecoming game on friday, and thought it would add to the excitement,” Locklear concluded.