It’s all about the money. Though Senior Survivor is a fun game, the main objective is to make the most money. Many people know and love the West Ottawa Senior Survivor game but don’t truly understand how it works. A survivor gets eliminated each night, but how do they decide who? This question is one of many West Ottawa students.
Starting on Monday, all twelve survivors walked the halls with carts full of goodies that they had purchased. The goal is to get donations of money in exchange for goodies. In addition to the carts, survivors win money by winning the games. Some games range from $100-$500 for placing in the top three. Each survivor competes to earn the most money while trying to stay alive. Some of the games played throughout the week have a prize of immunity. When the immunity is won, that survivor is safe without turning in money for elimination that night.
To stay alive, survivors choose an amount of money to spend each day towards not being eliminated. Kevin Klassen, a Student Senate advisor who runs Senior Survivor said, “They let me know how much of their money they want to use towards that night’s elimination ceremony and how much they want to “save” and roll over into the next day.” The struggle is that survivors don’t know how much money their competitors are turning in. Survivors must make their best assumptions to turn in more money than their competitors, but not too much money that they won’t make it through another night or have enough money to try to win.
Survivors sometimes talk and agree on how much money to put in, but you never know who’s being truthful or not. Current senior survivor Izzy O’Connor said, “As of now, I know who I can trust and who I can’t, but I’m just trying to keep to myself and not say too much about my money.”
The difficult part is balancing staying alive and saving money because once they spend the money to try to stay in for that day, it is no longer part of their earnings.
The survivor who turns in the least money a night is eliminated. Once a survivor is eliminated, they can give all their donations to another survivor they want to help. Klassen said, “If a survivor is eliminated and they have “money in the bank”, they can let me know if they want to transfer it to another survivor’s account or if they just want it to go in the “general fund” for WINWO.”
By the end of the week, the winner of West Ottawa Senior Survivor is chosen at the assembly from among the people still in the game based on who raised the most total money. The money raised throughout the week goes to the school’s foundation, When in Need West Ottawa (WINWO), which financially aids students in need.
