Every drop counts.

Students and staff at Porter Creek Secondary School seem to understand that, which is why they held the Students vs. Teachers and RCMP hockey game at the Canada Games Centre last night – the proceeds from which will go toward the Haiti/Japan relief fund.

(The score of the game is immaterial, especially if you're a teacher or an RCMP officer.)

"We have it pretty good here in the Yukon, but it's important to think outside the box and help other people in the world,” said school president Brad Gustafson, who was playing in net for the students.

"Hockey's a good way to raise money, because being in Canada, everyone loves hockey so a lot of people show up.”

The school held its first fund-raiser for Haiti last year after a catastrophic magnitude 7.0 earthquake hit the Caribbean country in January 2010, leaving an estimated 316,000 people dead, 300,000 injured and one million homeless.

Porter Creek Secondary principal Brendan Kelly said the school raised roughly $5,000 for Haiti last year.

"We got a real good bunch of students and staff that have a tremendous social conscience, and when they saw Haiti in such dire straits last year, we decided that we would do a hockey game,” Kelly said.

This year's Good Old Hockey Game raised $585, but the school, through cupcake sales and a skate-a-thon, as well as other fund-raisers, has raised roughly $1,000 to go toward relief in both Haiti and Japan.

In March, Japan was hit with a 9.0 magnitude undersea megathrust earthquake off the coast, sending a massive tsunami which left 13,591 dead, 4,916 injured and 14,497 missing, as well as nuclear shutdowns, failures and partial meltdowns to Fukushima nuclear power plants.

"We do it because we live in a world now with the Internet, everything is so global, people care about other people in other parts of the world, and at Porter Creek Secondary that comes through in all our students and staff,” Kelly said.

The money raised goes to the Canadian Red Cross, which had transferred $5 million in cash to the Japanese Red Cross within a week of the earthquake and tsunami, according to a March 19th Red Cross release. The money raised goes toward supporting emergency health and the distribution of relief items.

Gustafson said that helping any way the students can feels good.

"It's a good fund-raiser and has a lot of good meaning behind it,” he said.

"It means a lot. It just tells you that people here are considerate of others around the world, and that we truly do care about what's happening.”

Kelly said it's important to sustain the enthusiasm past the initial shock of the disaster.

"Most people jump on the bandwagon when it first happens and everybody comes out, but it takes a long while to rebuild a country and put people back on their feet.

This is why we took on the commitment for a couple years and we'll keep it going,” Kelly said.

"It's going to the Red Cross so we know it's going to a good organization that will get the funds to the people that need them.”

He added that the game also gives students and teachers a chance to be involved in an event together outside of school.

"This hockey game gives us a chance to build relationships with our students and parents and the community and do it for a good cause,” Kelly said.

"Sometimes when you're in school the principal and the teachers are seen in a different light; when you actually can get out and enjoy a sporting event or a camping event or a social event with the students, it shows a different side of everybody.”

That was evidenced during the game after each of the students' innumerable goals, when one of the teachers or RCMP officers would jokingly bump the scorer, and when, near the end of the third, Kelly turned the net around.

The students still scored, however.

"You got to realize that I'm the principal and I'm in charge of the score sheet, so it could be completely different at the end of the game,” Kelly laughed.

(Final score: students 16, teachers and RCMP 3.)