Number of Participants: 27
Hours Donated: 30
Value of Time Served: $6,845
Event Amount Raised: $5,152
Event Type: Health & Medicine
Sport: Ice Hockey
School: Hilton High School
Date: December 1, 2019
Location:
400 East Ave
Hilton, NY 14468
USA
About:
Our entire team and coaching staff was involved in this activity (27 players, 4 coaches). Their involvement was the entire month of November.
“MOvember is an annual event that is symbolized by growing a mustache to raise awareness about men’s health issues like prostate cancer, testicular cancer and mental health issues such as depression. What started in Australia in 2003 has blossomed into one of the biggest and most widely known fundraisers for men’s health; like breast cancer awareness, it’s truly become a global movement. By the year 2030, The MOvember Foundation vows to reduce the number of men dying prematurely by 25%. So, MOvember’s mantra is “for 30 days, grow your ‘mo and use it to raise funds for men’s health!”
This year, the Hilton Cadets Varsity Ice Hockey Team has decided to take on this worthy cause for a specific reason. The team has always prided itself with being more of a family than just a sports program. At the high school level, especially in Hilton, our educational based philosophy towards athletics provides for the opportunity for our student/athletes to realize that there is a world outside of themselves. It is imperative that they find every opportunity to give back to the community and their “family” as much as possible.
This past summer, one of the beloved members of our “family”, Phil DeGrandis, unexpectedly and tragically passed away. Phil was not only a great person and supporter, but integral to the success of our “family”. This individual would do anything that was asked of him in support of or players, and always did so with a smile on his face. This loss shook everybody in the Hilton Hockey Family, the Hilton community, and the hockey community to its core.
That is when Derek Zajac, a Father of Hilton Varsity Ice Hockey senior player and Captain, John Zajac, came up with the idea of having the young men of our program give back in honoring the memory of the man we lost, and to other men who passed way too soon. The best way he felt that we could do that would be participating in the MOvember Challenge to raise awareness of men’s health issues. The collection of student/athletes that are in the Varsity Ice Hockey program are outstanding young men, and they have accepted this challenge with the utmost of pride and character. Our original goal was to raise $1,000, but that number was surpassed rather quickly. As a team, we then set out to raise at least $2,000, and to date we have raised over $5, 152. This activity has made these young men of the Varsity Ice Hockey Program recognize how much a group can accomplish when they work together for a common goal. “