What started as a seven-week fundraising campaign quickly became a memorable and eye-opening experience for a group of York High School students determined to make a difference.
Led by rising juniors Ish Popat and Raiden Shah, Dukes United recently earned a third-place finish in the 2026 Chicago Student Visionaries of the Year campaign after raising approximately $80,000 to support blood cancer and leukemia research.
The student-led team spent weeks building connections throughout the Elmhurst community, organizing outreach efforts, speaking with local business owners and learning how to lead a large-scale fundraising initiative while balancing school, extracurricular activities and everyday life as high school students.
Throughout the campaign, the students quickly learned that the experience involved much more than simply raising money. The group coordinated social media campaigns, planned outreach opportunities, connected with community members and worked to keep teammates motivated throughout the seven-week process. Along the way, they developed valuable leadership, communication and teamwork skills while representing York High School and the Elmhurst community in a positive way.
“It’s definitely a big teaching lesson in leadership,” Shah said. “Running a team with other students is not an easy thing.”
One of the campaign’s biggest moments came after the students created and shared a social media video directed toward sports media personality Pat McAfee in hopes of bringing attention to their campaign. The post quickly gained traction online, eventually catching McAfee’s attention. Within hours, he followed the group online and later contributed a $15,000 donation on the final day of fundraising, helping bring even more awareness to the students’ efforts.
The students also worked closely with Elmhurst business owners and community supporters throughout the campaign, including organizing fundraising conversations and presentations with local leaders. Those opportunities pushed the students outside of their comfort zones and gave them firsthand experience presenting ideas, networking and advocating for a cause they believed in.
“I think another good skill is being able to present yourself and present ideas,” Popat said. “Without that, we wouldn’t have gotten as far.”
As the campaign continued to grow, so did the students’ confidence and understanding of the impact they could make through service and leadership. What began as a fundraising initiative evolved into an opportunity to unite people throughout the community around a shared cause.
For both students, seeing the final fundraising total and the support surrounding the campaign made the experience especially rewarding.
“I didn’t really expect that we’d get this much money in the beginning,” Popat said. “Now that I see that we did this, it feels accomplishing.”
The experience also inspired the two to explore bringing Dukes United to York High School as a student club in the future, allowing more students to participate in fundraising efforts and community impact initiatives.
District 205 congratulates Dukes United on an incredible accomplishment and commends the team for representing York High School and the Elmhurst community with compassion, leadership and determination throughout the campaign.