Saturday [Nov. 12] was the second annual finale to ChargerThon. It ran from 6 p.m. Saturday night to 6 a.m. Sunday morning and took place in the German Club. Students who participated began raising money months in advance, with all proceeds going to the Connecticut Children’s Medical Center through The Children’s Miracle Network.
The finale of the event was a twelve hour dance event, where students gathered with their teams for a night of dancing and games to celebrate while continuing to raise money.
The German Club was overrun with over 70 students at 6 p.m. Saturday night, in an effort to raise money for the great cause, and ready to dance the night away. The German Club was equipped with food stations with chips and fruit as well as a hydration station to help participants stay awake the full twelve hours. The 5,6,7,8 Dance Team also performed to keep morale high.
The theme of the night was Pixar, so each relay was modelled with a twist for a classic Pixar movie. Red-light-green-light became “Andy’s home” and contestants had to freeze when the phrase was heard. There was a lost shoe game where every contestant’s shoes were thrown into a pile and they had to find their own. This was designed to model the scene in Wall-E where he finds a flower growing out of a shoe. There was also a puzzle, where contestants had to construct Boo’s door from Monsters Inc.
Aside from the relays there was a “jail” participants could pay to place other participants in for an hour or until they paid to get out. This was an interesting way to raise money that added an extra event to the whole night.
“I loved getting to dance with my group and it was fun turning on them by paying to put them in jail for an hour,” says participant Tia Blauvelt.
Every hour throughout the event there was a ‘morale dance’ to get everyone on their feet, dancing with their friends. Along with this dance, a story was read about a child who had benefitted from previous donations. This let participates see the full weight of everything they were working towards.
“I thought I was getting tired of dancing until I remembered it was for the kids,” Nash Khairi says. “The hours flew by having fun with my brothers, raising money for such a great cause that happened to also be one of our philanthropies.”
Perhaps the greatest event of the night was not an event, but a child. Shemar, a young child who had benefitted from previous donations, spent a portion of the night playing capture the flag with the participants.
ChargerThon Director Krystle Pierce says, “Our goal was to have fun with it, to raise as much awareness and money as we could to give back to the children.”
At the end of the night, the final amount raised was revealed that a total of $6,268 was raised to help children battling with disease.
“My favorite part was seeing the total at the end. I could not have asked for anything more,” says Pierce.
If you are interested in helping with ChargerThon next year please email [email protected]. ChargerThon is looking forward to an even more successful night next year.
