Looking to support senior Oakmont High School student Julian Ortiz in the wake of a life threatening accident, RHS’ leadership class held a movie night and donated all the proceeds to Ortiz’s GoFundMe account.

The night of Oakmont’s homecoming dance, Ortiz got into a near fatal car accident. According to Oakmont principal Robert Hasty, Ortiz’s family is very grateful for the fundraiser. He also recently visited Ortiz and his family in the hospital.

“He is making great progress,” Hasty said. “Talking, walking, and is gaining motor and cognitive abilities everyday.”

According to Student Government teacher Brent Mattix, the leadership class came up with the idea of contributing the proceeds received from the movie night to Ortiz’s GoFundMe account.

“The whole class instantly got behind it and they had a purpose for the event,” Mattix said. “They just rallied together and decided that we wanted to have all the funds that we were able to fundraise go to Julian.”

According to Mattix, all of the proceeds were donated and there were students constantly purchasing items from the snack bar.

“We were able to bring in about $300, and typically we would not have brought in that much money but the students did a good job organizing the snack bar,” Mattix said. “We had a number of Oakmont students who were invited. We had over 100 students participate with the event.”

Mattix said that the overall atmosphere of the event was a positive one. According to Mattix, he is happy to hear of the progress that Ortiz has been making.  

“Anytime that you have somebody that’s injured that’s not good, especially when it’s a young person that is so full of life and has a bunch of opportunities; it’s nice to hear that he’s starting to make a recovery,” Mattix said.

Leadership students have made Mattix proud with their initiative to set-up this event.

“I think that something like this just kind of transcends between the two schools since it has a bigger purpose,” Mattix said.

According to Hasty, Ortiz has shocked his doctors with his recovery and there is hope for completing the next step in the recovery process.

“We hope he continues to move in this direction and hopefully makes a full recovery,” Hasty said.

RHS junior Jaenna Valdez, long-time friend of Ortiz, was in shock and disbelief when she received news of Ortiz’s accident.

“The first time I saw him, it really hit me, and I was so shocked and sad. I thought, ‘Wow, this is literally my childhood friend,’” Valdez said.

Valdez has been visiting Ortiz in the hospital. According to Valdez, she visits every other day.

“He is now doing physical and speech therapy and has passed many tests that check his abilities,” Valdez said. “He remembers a lot when answering ‘Who, what, when’ and has even counted by sevens backwards from 100.”

According to Valdez, this information and other updates on Ortiz, can be found on Caring Bridge Website. The movie night held at RHS had an emotional impact on Valdez.

“I felt very moved from the movie night and how all the proceeds were donated to Julian’s GoFundMe,” Valdez said. “I started tearing up.”

According to Valdez, Oakmont also came together to raise money to aid the Ortiz family in hospitalization expenses.

“The Oakmont students created bracelets for Julian, they created blue t-shirts, and soon will be having more t-shirts from the shirt drive created,” Valdez said.

Valdez believes that all life is valuable and we must cherish moments together.

“Personally, it had affected me so much that it made me think deeply that we must cherish our moments with one another and be good to each other, because anything can happen at any second,” Valdez said.