On Mizzou’s campus, one student organization is working to give patients battling blood cancers and other life-threatening diseases a second chance at life. The National Marrow Donor Program (NMDP) Chapter at Mizzou, which is led by president Gavin Schanz, focuses on raising awareness for stem cell and marrow donation by showing students how easy it is to make a real and life-saving impact.

The National Marrow Donor Program connects patients with potential stem cell and marrow donors through the largest registry in the country. For many patients, a transplant is their only option, and NMDP helps make that possible by supporting donors and patients.

“The whole mission is about giving people another chance,” said Schanz, a senior in nutrition and exercise physiology. “A lot of the patients we work with don’t have any other treatment options, so finding the right donor can literally save their life.”

Raising awareness is especially important on college campuses. Donors between the ages of 18 and 24 have the highest success rates, which puts college students in a good position to make a difference.

“With just a cheek swab, students can join the registry and potentially be someone’s life-saving match,” Schanz explained. “Every new person added really matters.”

Schanz’s motivation for starting the chapter at Mizzou came from a very personal place. As a freshman, he knew he wanted to get involved in something meaningful but didn’t know where to start. That changed after talking with his sister, who volunteered with NMDP while in medical school.

“She told me stories about the patients and what they go through every day,” Schanz said. “Hearing how much one donor could change someone’s life really stuck with me.”

What started as an idea for a single donation drive quickly grew into something bigger. Instead of hosting one event, Schanz decided to create a full student chapter so the impact would last well beyond his time at Mizzou.

Today, the chapter offers several ways for students to get involved, including hosting fundraising events, tabling across campus to add students to the registry, and helping educate others about the donation process.

Some members are also selected each year to travel to Minneapolis to visit NMDP’s national headquarters.

“That experience was honestly amazing,” Schanz said. “You really get to see how the work we’re doing on campus connects to saving lives on a national level.”

The impact of the chapter’s work is very real. One of the most meaningful stories Schanz shared came from a student right here at Mizzou.

“A student donated stem cells to her older sister when she was only 7 years old,” he said. “Later on, when her sister relapsed, the donor that saved her life was another college student from a completely different university who had signed up at an NMDP drive.”

That donor gave her a second chance, and today, she’s in medical school, getting ready to help others the same way someone once helped her.

Looking ahead, the Mizzou NMDP chapter has big goals. One is to add more than 1,000 students to the registry each year and continue expanding awareness across campus. Another is working toward a change in Mizzou’s attendance policy so stem cell and marrow donation-related commitments would count as excused absences.

“This would make it easier for students to donate without worrying about missing class,” Schanz said. “It’s something that could really help future donors.”

Beyond the life-saving impact, students involved in the chapter gain leadership, communication and advocacy experience — skills that apply far beyond campus.

For Schanz, there’s one thing he hopes people take away from learning about stem cell donation.

“One donor doesn’t just help a patient,” he said. “They give someone the chance to live the life they were almost denied. That’s a pretty powerful thing.”

This story was written by a student in AGSC_COM 2150, which gives students the opportunity to explore public relations and journalistic writing with real-world experience in CAFNR.