With treats such as cakes, loaves, brownies, cookies, donuts, cake pops and lemonade, the Animal Rights Club hosted a bake sale to raise money for the Sanctuary at Soledad Thursday, May 11, during lunch in the courtyard.

The Sanctuary at Soledad is a nonprofit organization based in Mayo, Florida, that was founded in 2015 by Julian and Carol Pearce. They rescue abused and neglected animals such as pigs, cows, goats, sheep, horses, dogs, cats and rabbits.

Freshman Sasha Capatori-Poole is one of the three co-leaders of the Animal Rights Club. This is her third year as a co-leader. Capatori-Poole joined the club because she believes animals deserve fair representation and protection.

Capatori-Poole said during first semester, the club met every other week, and presented on animal rights issues during their lunch meetings. Starting second semester, the club began planning a project to fundraise for an organization of their choice, and they decided the event would be a bake sale.

“We worked very closely with our club supervisor, Ms. Pav, and her assistant, Ms. Stone,” Capatori-Poole said. “They helped us plan the fundraiser, as well as Ms. Hazell-O’Brien, who helped raise attention to let the school know that [we] were going to have it.”

The bake sale earned $1,414 from the sales, and all proceeds will go to the Sanctuary at Soledad. They will use the money to pay for animal medical bills, food and maintaining the sanctuary. The Animal Rights Club chose this organization because it aligns with their values of treating animals with dignity, respect and fairness.

“We want to be polite and respectful while discussing animal rights,” Capatori-Poole said. “We want to raise awareness for the struggles that animals go through and how we can best support them.”

This is junior Lila Paschall’s first year as a co-leader and second year in the Animal Rights Club. She joined the club because she loves animals and enjoys working with the other leaders.

“I’ve always really loved animals,” Paschall said. “I think this club is a perfect opportunity to organize fundraisers for the animals.”

The third leader of the animal rights club is freshman Meredith Ho. This is Ho’s first year in the club, and she joined to spread awareness around animal-related issues. Ho said especially since there are dogs at Archer, it is important to spread awareness about animal rights to the community.

“I decided to [co-lead] because I really want to support Sasha as a friend, and I feel like I resonate with her values of spreading awareness about animal rights,” Ho said. “Since Archer has so many dogs and pets around, I think it’s amazing how we can spread awareness through our community.”