By Angela Ann Traylor, 12th grade
Special to The Tribune by students of FCCS
Stan Smith, President of University of Alabama at Birmingham Heart, Lung and Liver Transplant Support Group, and his wife Nancy Smith, started attending the support group in 1990, three months after Nancy’s heart-double lung transplant.
“It goes back to 1987,” Smith said. “When Nancy was first told she needed a transplant and we didn’t have anybody to talk to.”
The transplant program was so new back then and they had not done a heart-double lung transplant at UAB. They went to the library to find more information and all they could find was information about the first heart transplant done in South Africa. There was no internet at that time, or anything like that, and Nancy had no reference of what to expect.
“The inspiration to get involved in the support group is to help people gain more information about the process and help educate people about organ donation,” Smith said. “ A lot of people, when they are first told that they need a transplant, it can be scary to them. Talking to others that have gone through a transplant can share their story so that other people will not be afraid.”
Smith is extremely proud to add that the Alabama Organ Center has created a new award dedicated to Nancy. It’s called the “Nancy Smith Ambassador of the Year Award.” It will be presented every year to a volunteer of the Alabama Organ Center. He was surprised to be the first recipient of the award.
Smith has been recognized by his company with a community service award that Southern Company had given him. Mike Royer, formerly a local NBC-TV news anchor, recognized Smith on his weekly series, “The Spirit of Alabama.”
More information can be found at alabamaorgancenter.org and UNOS (United Network Organ Sharing) unitednetworkorgansharing.org.
In honor of the state of Alabama’s 200th anniversary approaching in 2019, Governor Kay Ivey launched the Alabama Bicentennial Schools Initiative in December 2017 to give 200 Alabama schools the opportunity to participate in a year-long project representing their state’s history and achievements.
Nearly 400 K-12 schools statewide submitted proposals for the program, and each of the 200 chosen schools received a $2,000 grant to complete their project.
Among the schools chosen for this honor were five home-school groups, one of which was Trussville’s own Faith Community Christian School (FCCS).
For their project, the students of FCCS are collectively writing a book called Everyone Has A Story, which will profile noteworthy Alabamians, selected by the children.
The middle and high school students took a six-week Journalism class in the fall where they learned to write profile news stories about everyday heroes, while the elementary students are writing biographies of famous Alabamians.