Chris Rogers Organizes Paintball Charity Event

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By M. MarksPosted In: HealthTagged: , , , ,

Sometimes you just have to get down and dirty for a good cause.  At least Terrence Cody, Chris Rogers and others believe so.  Former University of Alabama defensive back Chris Rogers recently organized a charity paintball tournament to raise money for breast cancer research.

In August of 2007, Rogers’ mom was diagnosed with breast cancer. He was inspired by her courage and said that her struggle actually fueled his performance when he played.  In 2009, Rogers said, “There is a need for us athletes to give back, and how do we do that?”

With the help of a professor in graduate school, Sue Parker, Rogers devised a plan.  His charity, Together Assisting People, worked with the Breast Cancer Research Foundation of Alabama to create the recent fundraiser.

Many of Chris Rogers’ football friends came out for the event. As Brad Smelley said, “We try to rally behind our players when they try to do something like this.” In attendance were: Terrence Cody, Marcell Dareus, Marquis Maze, Glen Coffee, Roy Upchurch, Eryk Anders, Brad Smelley, Brandon Gibson and Will Lowery. Professional boxer and Tuscaloosa native Deontay Wilder was there as well.

As 2009 Heisman Trophy winner Mark Ingram said, “It just shows how much of a family-oriented program we are. Some of us played with each other, some of us didn’t. But at the same time, we all come back here and support each other.”

Some who had made it to the big leagues were there as well. As Terrence Cody, a former offensive lineman for Alabama and a current NFL player said, “My position coach with the Baltimore Ravens, his wife survived breast cancer, so he likes the fact that I support it, and I’ve got breast cancer license plates on both of my vehicles.”

In total, 13 teams of three competed at the Splatzone Paintball field to benefit the two charities.

Delaware County Community Market Makes a Difference…One Egg at a Time

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Delaware County Community Market

It’s a match made in heaven that Delaware County Community Market has created.  Located at 222 E. William Street, the market owned by Rick Dinovo will offer patrons a way to buy their groceries and give back to their favorite charities at the same time.  When people come to the market to purchase their groceries, 75% of the money will go to the vendor; 5% will go to the market; and 20% will be given to a charity of the shopper’s choice.

As Bob Sullivan-Neer, the store manager said,

“You can buy your eggs and help out a charity at the same time.”

The market has registered with 90 charities for patrons, or patrons can submit a suggestion for a charity that isn’t on the list. Some of the more popular charities that people have contributed to so far include: the Common Ground Free Store, the Stratford Ecological Center and the Special Olympics.

Certainly, the plan is a lovely one for the community; but it also happens to be brilliant for business.  They’ve found that, since they started the charity initiative, sales at the market have been up 65% since last year.

To keep shoppers appraised of their fundraising efforts, the market has a website where customers can select their charitable organizations and watch how much shoppers have donated to date.  Shoppers can also indicate their charitable donations for tax return purposes.

Now that’s a way to keep shoppers coming back – and to do something great for those around you.

Joe Anderson’s Donation Tips the Balance

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2012 Southwest Florida Wine & Food Fest

We should all have friends like Joe Anderson of Benovia Winery in Florida.  On February 24th and 25th, the 2012 Southwest Florida Wine & Food Fest raised money to donate to three charities that benefit children’s health care in the Southwest Florida area.  In total, the event brought in $2 million net.

Anderson Pledge

Joe Anderson pledged $100,000 and inspired many other bidders to continue making donations.  The event itself, in addition to the astronomical sums that it raised, was a place to enjoy.  The NFL Baltimore Ravens cheerleaders were there, dancing and encouraging auction goers; Cliff Williams of AC/DC was in attendance; and a Danica Patrick look-a-like was making the rounds.  The event, which took place at the Miromar Lakes Beach & Golf Club included professional auctioneer Scott Robertson, voiceover artist Chris Corley and NBC-2’s Kellie Burns.

As Steve Machiz, M.D., the Southwest Florida Wine & Food Fest founding chairman, said

“We exceeded our expectations again this year, thanks to our very philanthropic supporters. We netted $1.6 million last year. The trustees, dinner hosts, wineries, chefs and donors really stepped up to take this event truly over the top. I am always amazed by the generosity of the wonderful people attending Wine Fest.”

Helping Those in Need

Most of the proceeds from the event this year will go to the Children’s Hospital of Southwest Florida. Their neonatal intensive care unit will get nine new incubators called the GE Giraffe baby incubators.  These incubators mimic the mother’s womb and are vital for babies in intensive care.

The Edison State College will receive funds for its pediatric nursing program and the Florida Gulf Coast University will receive for its music therapy program.

Denver Bronco Safety Quinton Carter Making a Difference

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Quinton Carter

Quinton Carter

It’s always heartwarming to see famous people who are doing good deeds.  Denver Bronco safety Quinton Carter is one of these.  Last Friday, he joined other NFL players and celebrities for a two-week charitable trip to Uganda and Tanzania with Pros for Africa.  While there, they will dig water wells and offer hearing aids and food to people in need.

Carter was looking forward to the trip to Africa and expected to be joined by other NF players including Larry Fitzgerald, Vernon Davis, Tommie Harris and Santonio Holmes. In his unassuming manner he said,

“I hear Miley Cyrus is going to be there, so that’s pretty star-studded. I’ll feel like a regular person on the trip.”

Carter has been waiting for two years to be part of this charitable trip; he was unable to participate while in school at that time. Now, he was very excited to be part of something so special.

As he said,

“It’s the smiles. When you see those smiles, you just know you touched people. Seeing people cry because you touch them, it’s an unexplainable feeling.”

He continued, “I’m just doing what I can, the least I can do. It goes to show you the power that athletes and entertainers and people with influence have. Even if you’re not a big star – like I’m not a big star – but it’s crazy the influence I can have in a positive light on people.”

Carter is always amazed by the many opportunities that he has to change lives.  As he said,

“It’s crazy to me because it’s so simple and all it takes is some time. If everybody just puts in a little bit of time – a little bit of time – and a conversation, it goes a long way. You’ve just got to be focused and have some people around you that have that same common goal.”

Midwest Sports Fans Donating to Military Charity

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Operation Homefront

Operation Homefront

Sometimes people get it right – and the sports blog Midwest Sports Fans has certainly just done so.  On their site, they explain that they recognize that their job, blogging about sports, is not the most important activity in the world.  To bring more depth to their site, and to do something good with their passion for sports, they are creating a way to donate a portion of the MSF revenue to worthy causes.

Starting today, March 1, they will be donating a portion of their revenue to Operation Homefront, a charity that provides emergency financial and other help to families of those who serve. MSF will continue donating a portion of the revenue they generate from each pageview to Operation Homefront until September 15th, when they will turn their sights to another charity.

As MSF explains on their site,

“In fact, March is annually our highest-traffic month by a long shot. As soon as we decided to launch this program, we knew we wanted to fast track it to leverage our March traffic spike into a sizable donation for a good cause. Enter the wonderful folks at Operation Homefront.”

MSF will specifically be working with Operation Homefront’s Team Operation Homefront. This is an endurance event program that raises money for the larger charity.  Participants run to raise money for Operation Homefront, while honoring a specific veteran in the process.

Way to go MSF. And here’s hoping that they generate a lot of sports traffic in the coming months!

The Good Teenagers

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Supporting Educational Programs for Kids

It seems that sometimes, teenagers just get a bad rap.  But truthfully, those are just the stories we hear about.  There are countless other tales of teens doing good things – really good things – out of the goodness of their hearts.  And that is exactly what has been happening in Norwalk when two volunteer teens used their love of math to support educational programs in the area.

Two students and St. Luke’s School –15 year-old Khushwant Dhaliwal and 16 year-old Sheetal Akole – rather than spending their Saturday afternoons engaging in some mindless activity, instead can be found at the Fairfield Math Club where they coach fifth to eighth graders for national math contests.  With the donations they receive from the students they are assisting, they choose a charity to help out.  For example, Dhaliwal just raised $300 and Akole, $800 for the Family & Children’s Agency.  Akole asked it to be used for the charity’s After School Program that gives academic support to 50 students in Norwalk public middle school.

Math Club Mission

As Akole pointed out, the math club’s mission is to provide a community service by helping prepare students for math contests and, simultaneously, help charities through such activities.  Naturally, the charity was thrilled to accept these donations.  It’s the second consecutive year Akole has chosen this charity and a first time for Dhailwal.  It shows that these teens have a very strong value of the importance of education in the community and wish to ensure others have as many educational opportunities as possible.

Students Feeding Each Other?

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Students at Middle Tennessee colleges recognized hunger amongst their peers and decided to do something about it. They opened up food pantries so that students would no longer go hungry.  Thus today, Austin Peay State and Tennessee State facilities are able to offer free food and toiletries for students encountering temporary difficulties due to economic uncertainty and inflation.  Canned foods and cereals are being given to them to try to supplement their lacking diet.

Save Our Students

The project all began when students at Austin Peay discovered some students were attending classes hungry. They thus took matters into their own hands and started a social work graduate class project.  The next step was to work in conjunction with the university, launching the “Save Our Students” food pantry, providing students with enough food for about three days.

One of the issues that has led to students reaching the poverty line and going hungry, is that parents who would otherwise have supported their children more financially, are losing jobs and homes and simply cannot afford to do so anymore.  So for those not eligible to receive Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or food stamps, for various reasons, this is the solution.

Pay It Forward?

Simultaneously, moving over to the University of Central Missouri, business students are providing local day cares and preschools with backpacks of food.  This began when the Early Childhood Hunger Operation during the 2011 fall semester was adopted by one of the classes.  In Warrensburg, $930 and over 50 backpacks of food to children in the area was donated by the ECHO project that sprung out of a UCM class. It is still in operation and going well.  This began with business students and social workers joining forces to find out what was needed.  They saw the kids come for a morning snack who were stuffing themselves, clearly because they were starving.  Thus it was deemed necessary to engage in this project.

Students Hunger Strike

And then there are the students globally who are being educated on hunger issues and taking it upon themselves to “go hungry – so others don’t have to.”  They are being educated on what is going on with the world’s hungry – 925 million people who are not getting enough sustenance daily with around 11,000 children under the age of 5 dying due to hunger.

So, in response to this, many students “do the Famine,” not eating for 30 hours so that they can feel what it is like to be hungry. Thereafter they raise funds to help hungry families around the world. Every $30 raised by each group can help feed and care for a child for a month. Powered by World Vision, The Famine is not just feeding kids for today — it is giving them the opportunity to beat hunger for a lifetime.

Let’s hope the Famine doesn’t come to students in America – without them campaigning against it in third world countries – and that caring individuals in western world countries take action today to ensure this doesn’t happen.

Getting Glasses to Kids

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The Specsavers Opticas chain recently announced that their Javea and Calpe stores will be supporting various different charitable endeavors in 2012, including Caritas, EMAUS and The Lions Club. 

The Lions Club

It will be able to help those who cannot afford glasses by collecting second-hand glasses for The Lions Club.  As it is, these branches of Specsavers Opticas already offers people the opportunity to drop off second hand glasses. But this new campaign will be encouraging more people to join this so that second-hand glasses in good condition don’t go to waste.

Caritas

Caritas supports needy families and individuals around the world who don’t have access to life’s basics like food, clothing and shelter.  One recent example of its work was when it was asked to help a boy who needed glasses so badly, he couldn’t even perform well at school.  So it made contact with Specsavers Javea which was pleased to provide assistance to the boy without charging the family a dime. 

EMAUS

Specsavers Opticas has also been supporting EMAUS Children’s Home in Altea by giving the kids living there who need them, glasses. Again, like its work at Caritas, it enables poor-sighted children who live there to be able to live a higher quality of life by significantly improving their sight with the use of glasses, something people without poverty issues don’t even think about.

UK Health Charities to Get Cash Injection

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The Benenden Healthcare Society

In 2012, the Benenden Healthcare Society will be giving large amounts of money to two valuable charities in the UK: actionforchildren.org.uk”>Action for Children which “supports and speaks out for the UK's most vulnerable and neglected children and young people, for as long as it takes to make a difference in their lives…” and Yorkshire Air Ambulance (an independent charity providing a life saving rapid response emergency service to 5 million people across Yorkshire). 

It is hoping substantial monies will be raised for these two charities since in 2011, a new fundraising method was put in place which resulted in more than £3000 to be split amongst the two chosen charities of that year.  The hope for 2012 is that even more money will be raised.

How Beneden Healthcare Works

Benenden Healthcare raises funds to provide “affordable mutual healthcare to employees of the public sector as well as their friends and family.”  It is a complimentary service to the UK’s National Health Service that is totally overwhelmed by offering free healthcare to all UK citizens.  When one therefore ends up needing additional care, Benenden Healthcare is the solution.  The way it works is that employees are able to select the charities democratically – and these will be the ones which will benefit from the Society’s fundraising for this year.  So why these two?  What do they do?  How are they helping UK citizens in the field of health? Let’s take a look.

Action for Children

Clearly, this worthy charitable endeavor has exerted extreme efforts to bring smiles to the faces of many kids.  Just one recent example is the case of a 10-year-old sports fanatic who has been given the opportunity to walk out onto the Wembley football pitch next week.  He will be escorting one of the football players – no doubt his hero – during the England Vs Holland game.

How did Action for Children arrange this?  The young lads – 10-year-old Trey Jennings (who has undergone various obstacles with his family) and Luke Stevenson (who has Aspergers Syndrome) – had their names pulled out of a hat in a cool idea set up by  the charity with the help of the FA and the Kirklees Family Intervention Project. It seems a lot of people want to help those who are less well-off than ourselves, and giving to kids in this way will sure render a lot of smiles when they get to do something they only dreamed about.  Clearly, Action for Children makes a real difference in the life of vulnerable kids.

Yorkshire Air Ambulance

Moving over to the other chosen charity, this organization provides a crucial  service to Yorkshire – ambulances – but cannot manage without huge cash injections since it relies on outside funds from the kindness of others to keep it in operation.  

It’s bad enough that it doesn’t get adequate financing from the government for its venture, but recently, the organization has had to start a new battle with the authorities: to get a VAT rebate on all the fuel they use.  Thankfully one resident, Ken Sharpe, is on the case and has to date, collected close to 4,000 signatures for his e-petition against this.  In all fairness though to the British government, it doesn’t have all that much control over this since it is being bamboozled by EU legislation which doesn’t give individual countries under its auspices the power to extend VAT zero rates to any kind of charitable organizations.  But now enough noise has been made and in the Houses of Parliament, one active MP, Mr. Bayley tabled an Early Day Motion to get grants to over the fuel VAT.  Not surprisingly, from all parties the motion won huge amounts of support, crossing party lines.  As he said, “I hope the Chancellor will agree to return the VAT which Yorkshire Air Ambulance pays, so that the service receives the same benefit as the lifeboat service.”

At least if this goes through then Yorkshire Air Ambulance will be able to use the funds it will be receiving from Benenden Healthcare for other expenses, rather than wasting it on bills it shouldn’t need to be paying.

 

Singing For Our Boys

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There hasn’t been a charity hit like it in over 15 years and it ranked as the fastest-selling single since 2008.  So who did it and what did they sing? The Military Wives sang “Wherever You Are” and it must have really hit home because over £500, 000 was raised for military charities throughout the UK. 

The amount raised even shocked the 100-piece group that came together to form this winning combination following a British TV show called ‘The Choir.’ Along with help from professional choirmaster Gareth Malone, they worked hard and won the fight against Little Mix’s rendition of Damien Rice’s Cannonball to the Christmas.

Up In Lights

Last night, the song – comprised of wives of soldiers living in Plymouth, UK – was shortlisted in the ‘British Single’ category at London’s 02 Arena Brit Awards. Mingling with stars such as One Direction, Adele and Jessie J., The Military Wives enjoyed a night filled with anticipation and hope for possible future fame for the choir, even though they ultimately didn’t win the award which went to One Direction for their hit single last year, “What Makes You Beautiful.”