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Dozens turn out for walk and run to raise funds for ALS
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Austintown junior Kelsie Diefenderfer smiles as she leads a pack of runners to the finish line of the 1-mile race during the First Polar Run at Austintown Fitch High School on Sunday night. The event featured two 1-mile races and a 2-mile walk to raise awareness for ALS.
By ROBERT CONNELLY
AUSTINTOWN
A class project led 134 people to take part in a walk and run to raise funds for ALS on Sunday night on the Fitch High School track.
Austintown school district students, children and parents came out to the First Annual Polar Run, spearheaded by Fitch senior Garen Gibson, 18. The event featured two 1-mile runs, one for those who could complete a mile run in six minutes or longer and another one for those that could run it in six minutes and under, and a 2-mile walk. The program took place from 6 to 8 p.m.
“I didn’t expect this many people to come and bring their families, too,” Gibson remarked at the start of the event Sunday.
“It really shows how strong our community is when one person knows about it and it spreads.”
Gibson picked an event related to ALS — amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or Lou Gehrig’s disease — because the class read the book “Tuesdays with Morrie.”
ALS is a progressive neuro-degenerative disease that affects nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord. No known cause or cure has been found.
The event came out of a class project for Honors English at Fitch, taught by Cindy McCutcheon. Gibson, along with at least 15 fellow students in the class, worked on the project.
Austintown teacher Kristin O’Neill spoke at the event with her family. Both her mother and mother-in-law both died from ALS — she was the caregiver for both women. Her mother was diagnosed with Lou Gehrig’s disease three weeks after O’Neill’s mother-in-law died in 2004.
“It is imperative that we continue to raise money for ALS awareness and experimentation. I truly believe we are very close to a cure,” O’Neill told the crowd Sunday.
She later spoke about the doctor who cared for both her mother and mother-in-law. She said his first patient was her mother-in-law, diagnosed with ALS, followed by her mother. In the four years before her mother succumbed to ALS, the doctor saw seven more ALS patients.
“More and more people you are hearing have it. We don’t know the reasons, but back [in the early 2000s] with my mother and mother-in-law, it was unheard of,” O’Neill said.
Andrew Welsh, 17 and a classmate of Gibson’s, said his mother told coworkers about the event. She works at an area hospital.
“People in the medical field often see people suffering, and to see people coming out to try and raise money to try and stop the suffering that the patients endure while they’re under their care, it’s just great,” Welsh said of their response to the event.
Fitch principal Chris Berni attended the event and marveled at what a simple class project turned into on the Fitch track Sunday night.
“It really makes me proud of our students and how much they care about our community and how they genuinely want to make a difference in the lives of others,” Berni said. “They’ve done all of this because they care — not for glory — but because they want to be a part of something bigger than themselves.”
Participants paid $20 for the event and received a T-shirt. The proceeds are set to be evenly divided between the ALS Foundation and Christine Terlesky, a former Boardman teacher diagnosed with the disease and a sister of an Austintown teacher. Gibson said each will get more than $500 from the event.
O’Neill, Berni and Gibson hope to see the event continue and grow. Gibson said he doesn’t know if he will pass the event to someone else to run — that will be decided by his college choice or if he will personally continue it.
“I think the reason why it will really grow is because the word will spread that the vision of this event was started by high school students. Just by ordinary people in the community who said you know what, we need to do something big,” Berni said.