The Builders Club is an elective at Spring Valley’s College Preparatory Middle School that organizes the school’s philanthropic branch and participates in several charitable fundraisers throughout the school year.

Catherine Spencer, the eighth-grade science teacher, runs the Builders Club elective. Eighth-grade students take it, which is focused on fundraisers and learning about how to improve the Earth.

Once all of the fundraisers are complete, the Builders Club forwards the money to the main School Administrators who then donate it to the given charity. At the end of each nine-week school quarter, the students switch electives until everyone has been in every elective, including the Builders Club.

The Make-A-Wish Foundation is a donation-based organization created for children with critical illness to get a wish funded by the general public. The child’s wish is something that they’ve always wanted to do, go somewhere they’ve always wanted to go, or to meet somebody that they’ve always wanted to meet.

It was founded April 19, 1980 by Frank Shankwitz and Linda Bergendahl-Pauling after helping Christopher James Greicius, who had terminal leukemia, complete his lifelong dream of becoming a police officer. After that, they branched out making their own website to support children with terminal illness. Make-A-Wish has helped 550,000 children with terminal illness have their dream come true.

In order to raise money for the Make-A-Wish Foundation, the 2025 Quarter Three Builders Club created many promotions in order to gain traction for the fundraiser. These promotions included donation boxes, custom made and placed in each homeroom, and promotions through the school announcements. Students of the Builders Club elective created posters around the school to get the word out about donating to this fundraiser. The homeroom that collected the most donations received a sweet treat. The fundraiser was held for three weeks and the donations were slow at first, but as time went on, the donations started coming in more and more. Soon the weeks came to end and the entire school was able to raise over $1,000 to donate to the Make-A-Wish Foundation!

Previously the 2023 Builders Club held a Make-A-Wish Fundraiser of their own and raised $1,166 to donate to Make-A-Wish Foundation. The 2023 Builders Club also went through the same steps as the 2025 Builders Club of creating decorative boxes, promotion posters, and setting the boxes in various homerooms for donations. The Make-A-Wish Foundation was appreciative of the generous donations that were donated both years, and CPMS received “Thank You” letters for the donations.

These two Make-A-Wish Fundraisers aren’t the only two charitable events organized by the Builders Club elective at College Preparatory Middle School. The Builders Club has sponsored multiple fundraisers in the past to help many people in need, such as for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society and Trick or Treat for Unicef.

For years to come, this elective will continue to go on at College Prep, allowing for more students to learn the importance of helping others and leaving a positive impact on people of our society.

Editor’s note: This article was written by CPMS eighth-grade students Troy Grilz and Gabriel Jacob Espino.

CAPTION: Two CPMS students show off the amount of funds raised for a good cause. (Courtesy photo)