Lucy Hale Helping Raise Awareness of Teen Meningitis

Actress-turned-country-singer Lucy Hale recently stepped slightly out of her comfort zone in the name of a great cause. The star hosted a high school singing competition to raise awareness for meningitis among teens.

Although the "Lie a Little Better" hitmaker isn't the most likely advocate for meningitis, it made sense to her to get involved due to the average age of her fanbase. She's an actress on the ABC Family show Pretty Little Liars, which is immensely popular among teens. Hale is thankful her success in acting and singing has allowed her to speak out on important issues like this one.

"Voices of Meningitis is something that really spoke to me. They’ve been around for about seven years now and this year took on a whole new angle about spreading awareness about meningococcal meningitis," Hale says, giggling as she slightly stumbles over the term. "And the second vaccination by launching a musical themed campaign called Boost the Volume, and that’s kind of where I get tied in."

Hale began working with the campaign in March, when she called on high school acappella groups to submit videos of themselves singing a medley of inspirational songs. The singer says judging them was "really fun," and she was able to narrow the best down to just four groups, with one being the grand prize winner. That honor went to Calabasas High School — Hale was totally "blown away" by their power.

All schools in the final four got a visit from Hale and Jamie Schanbaum, a meningitis survivor, as well as nurse Sally Schoessler, who together sought to educate students and perform with the acapella groups. Social media was a great asset in spreading the word further, using the hashtag in support of the vaccine, #BoostTheBooster.

Hale says that even though the students didn't directly ask for advice, she hopes some of them pursue careers in the arts. “I wish all of them the best of luck with whatever they pursue," she sweetly explains, adding that she'd tell them to, “Do what makes you happy. You have to have the mentality that anything is possible. You create your own destiny 100%."

Though she was forced to cancel her Road Between tour due to an illness, Hale isn't done making country music. "We’re back filming season six of PLL so that pretty much takes up the majority of my time, but we’re starting to think about album two now, and stylistically where I want to go and how I want to evolve," she explains of future plans.

"I’m constantly songwriting and coming up with ideas, so I hope that when I get a little free time from filming, we can start working on that," she adds. "Music is always going to play an important role in my life … I’m excited to share some new stuff with you guys soon.”

We can't wait for Hale's new music, either, but for now, she wants teens and their parents to head to Boost the Volume to learn how they can prevent death caused by meningitis.

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