The line began forming in Whitman's South Cafeteria right after school and the lineup of hair cutters for St. Baldrick’s Day were ready. Most were there to participate and many were there to watch as Whitman Principal Kathie Acker took her place in the barber’s chair.
Whitman science teacher Jamie Rogers and his Robotics Club have been organizing St. Baldrick’s at Walt Whitman for the past eight years. One by one, the pile of shaved hair got deeper and deeper and then, with a pause in the action, Ms. Acker readied herself. The sophomore class was the winner in class donations and its president Dylan Diamond got the honor of the first cut. It was only then that Gina Ribando from Anthony DeFranco Salon took over and left Ms. Acker with a freshly shorn head.
As part of the annual event held at Walt Whitman High School, South Huntington’s Maplewood Intermediate School pooled their resources and made a big showing surpassing their goal by totaling over $17,000. Teachers Chris Cardella, Tom Keogh, Rob Dwyer, Anthony Fauci (beard), and Dan Campbell received donations that allowed students to shave their teacher’s heads. Students couldn’t resist, and of course the winners are the many children battling cancer that the donations will go to. Individuals throughout the district, including many teachers solicited donations and offered up their heads to be shaved. Overall top participants included Seth Goldman from Stimson and Brian Dreher from Walt Whitman.
They were still counting the donations at the end of the week, and more were coming in. The overall total for Wednesday’s St. Baldricks Day at Whitman, online and collected on-site is over $33,000. Money is still coming in online. In fact you can still donate online by going to: https://www.stbaldricks.org/donate/event/491/2015
St. Baldrick's is an organization that raises money to help find a cure and treat childhood cancers. Since the founding of St. Baldrick's, the survival rate of the common cancers has risen to 85%.
We want to thank all of the participants and especially to the Walt Whitman Robotics Club, with Jaime Rogers as their advisor, and Maplewood teacher Daniel Campbell, his fellow teachers and the entire Maplewood school community, who really got behind this incredible day and event. We are already looking at dates for next year’s event and invite the whole district to jump onboard and be brave…shave for St. Baldrick’s.
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