On Saturday, January 31, the Beta Club chapter of Apollo High School hosted DanceBlue, a mini marathon of 6 hours where 300+ students from Apollo, Burns Middle, College View Middle, UK, and the Alpha Omicron Pi sorority from KWC danced and played games the entire time. The only rule was no sitting; participants must stand and be active the entire time out of respect for children who are fighting pediatric cancer. All funds raised through the efforts of the participants go to the newly named DanceBlue KCH (Kentucky Children’s Hospital) Pediatric Hematology/Oncology Clinic at the University of Kentucky.
Students played different games each hour as each had a different theme, such as Holiday Hour, Rock of Ages Hour, Disney Hour, and Greek Hour. The first hour every one learned a 6 minute line dance to a medley of music that was performed at the top of each hour. Halfway through the evening, participants were treated to dinner donated by local businesses, such as Applebee’s, Subway, Chick-Fil-A, American Cookie Company, and Papa John’s. The last hour is Celebration of Life hour where students saw a video of the Clinic and heard from a representative of the University of Kentucky who told students the beginnings of DanceBlue. Apollo’s Drama Club also performed a short skit in hour of the cause. Throughout the event, we also had check presentations from Apollo’s Student Council, College View Middle School’s Junior Honor Society, and First Security Bank! Thanks to all of these donations, we surpassed our goal! Finally, at the end of the evening there was the big reveal which showed that the students raised $12,329.76!
In two weeks on February 14, Apollo’s DanceBlue Committee will travel to UK to present their donation at UK’s 24-hour DanceBlue event. The students will present a combined check of this year’s marathon in addition to Apollo’s first year marathon held last March totaling $18, 136.92!
I am so very proud of Apollo’s students and all of our participants and volunteers who cam together for a fun evening all in the name of a great cause! It is tremendous to see our school’s young people learn that they too can give back and impact someone’s life. I appreciate my student planning committee and their parents, in addition to some of our teachers, and the volunteers who helped to make this night a success! For The Kids!
