Campus News

DanceBlue 2023 raises $1.65 million; total fundraising surpasses $20 million

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LEXINGTON, Ky. (March 27, 2023) — Beginning 8 p.m. Saturday night, University of Kentucky students gathered in Memorial Coliseum to stand in solidarity with the patients and families of the DanceBlue Kentucky Children’s Hospital Hematology/Oncology Clinic. Twenty-four long hours later, they cheered, wept and danced in celebration of this year’s fundraising total: $1,650,857.26.

DanceBlue creates an energy that is rarely emulated in other areas of campus life. More than 600 students who could have spent their weekend socializing or studying instead devoted their time to Kentuckians in need. Dancers on the floor this weekend spent their entire school year thus far fundraising and attending DanceBlue events to gain spirit points to secure their place on the floor.

The 2023 marathon was the first year DanceBlue welcomed back spectators for all 24 hours since DanceBlue 2020. Spectators are a crucial part of the marathon. During the wee hours of the night, seeing a friend holding up a sign with your name on it, or hearing people in the stands clap while you’re doing a line dance has a huge impact on the morale of participants. This year, the DanceBlue leadership team created a new committee to help bolster attendance and create a sense of team spirit that has been missing the past couple of years.

Lauren Grant is the first DanceBlue community relations chair. Her goal was to show Lexington the true impact the program has on patients in the clinic.

“The Lexington community has supported DanceBlue since the beginning,” said Grant. “All of our mini marathons, fundraising events, 5K runners and marathon volunteers are made possible by this community. Without their support, we would not be where we are today.”

Community Relations also worked on some crowd engagement hours to bring some of the fun from the floor to the stands. During those hours, the crowd was able to participate in different games and contests that all had the driving focus of making dancers feel supported. These times were also popular on the Alumni Balcony, where past DanceBlue participants come back year after year to support the cause.

Just below the balcony is an area of DanceBlue that not many see — the family room. This is the designated space that DanceBlue sets aside for clinic patients, families and staff. Normally serving as a film room for athletics, the room gets a complete makeover each year according to a theme chosen by the DanceBlue Family Relations committee. This year, students chose a theme close to home: Jarrett’s Joy Cart.

Jarrett Mynear was a smart, friendly young man who passed away in 2002 after a battle with Ewing’s sarcoma, a rare bone cancer. Before his passing, Jarrett had a couple of requests, one of them being to raise funds to improve the pediatric oncology outpatient clinic at Kentucky Children’s Hospital. This request later led his mother Jennifer to meet with UK students and eventually form the first DanceBlue in 2006. The other request was the continuation of a project he had already started, Jarrett’s Joy Cart.

"We chose to honor Jarrett's legacy this year because we never want the foundation of DanceBlue to be forgotten," said DanceBlue Family Relations Chair Reagan Watkins. "Jarrett was an incredible kid who could’ve wallowed in his unfortunate situation. However, he chose to do what he could with the time he had and focused on serving others. That’s the heart of DanceBlue, and we wanted to remind everyone that."

After 18 years of standing for the kids, DanceBlue has raised more than $20 million. However, most of the students involved will say that it’s not only about the money raised.

For more information on this year’s marathon, or how you can get involved next year, visit DanceBlue.org.

 

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