BATON ROUGE - As most students prepare to return to school, a local boy is hospitalized battling a rare bacteria and other health issues -- but his classmates are rallying to support him.

A prayer vigil for Madden Brown is being held at Central Private school Monday at 8 p.m.

Madden is a rising 8th-grade student, but he has spent the final days of summer break battling severe illness that traces to a bacterial infection and related problems.

Family and friends are providing updates on his condition through social media. They say issues of concern include sepsis with acute respiratory failure and septic shock; hypoxia; liver lesions; and a spleen lesion.

Madden is being treated at Our Lady of the Lake Children's Hospital, where he is in the Intensive Care Unit.

Monday night's vigil will be staged at the flagpole outside Central Private. The address is 12650 Gurney Road in Central.

The school held a fund-raising event for the Brown family over the past weekend.