Sophomore Grace Caltabellotta earned Student of the Year honors as she and her teammate, Naomi Christian, raised $39,000 in sales to fight cancer recently. The pair hosted a fundraising thrift shop at El Jardin restaurant in Liberty Station.
Sponsored by the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society, the world’s largest nonprofit fighting blood cancer, Students of the Year is a seven-week philanthropic leadership development program fostering entrepreneurship, marketing, and project management skills.  
The two students sold curated clothing, bags, shoes and accessories collected from friends and family.
Said Caltabellotta of her motivation, “I did it because I wanted to help the people I loved who were effected by cancer … it was never our motivation to win just help people with this terrible disease. … We planned a Pop Up Thrift Shop at Liberty Station, but it evolved into a huge community event. We raised eight times the amount of money we expected.”
“This campaign has been such an amazing experience,” added Christian. “Participating in this campaign has really opened my eyes to everyone affected by cancer and it means so much to me to have taken part in the fight. When they revealed the collective total of all the candidate’s efforts, I was astonished.”