Many students and staff at LHS have heard about, raised awareness for or donated to sophomore Travis Barfield’s cause. Barfield has been in a coma since Jan. 3, and each day in the hospital is adding to the increasing amount of medical bills for his family.

Some have created ways to help with these medical costs such as a GoFundMe and selling t-shirts. Paraeducator Demetrius Kemp has spread information about these ways for students and staff to help as well as assisted in starting a bowling fundraiser for Barfield on Saturday, Feb. 13.

“I work at the bowling alley, so I was like ‘you know what?’ We need to have a bowling fundraiser,” Kemp said. “We’ve done it for people in the past and it helps because a lot of people love bowling.”

Royal Crest Lanes, where Kemp works, often holds bowling fundraisers to benefit groups or individuals by donating portions of their profit from a scheduled date and time to the cause. In this case, half of the proceeds on Saturday between 4 and 7 o’clock will go to Barfield and his family.

“You can go and bowl in there for an hour for $10 and you can’t beat that,” Kemp said. “Then $5 of the $10 goes to the family.”

Kemp said he was motivated to help because Barfield is a part of the “Lawrence High family.” Medical bills can pile up and burden a family, and any way to help is beneficial to reduce that load, he said.

“I want to raise the money to help them because being in the hospital for over a month—on those types of machines and in that condition—I can’t imagine having to pay that,” Kemp said.

Royal Crest Lanes will be hosting the fundraiser this Saturday, Feb. 13 from 4-7.

“I think that fundraiser will help them a lot,” Kemp said.

Contact Demetrius Kemp about helping, donating or buying a t-shirt at [email protected] or (785)-424-0838