Community rallies with strength & generosity

Guest blog by Mick Galloway

Assistant Principal, Brevard High School

In 2008 I was asked to chair the Relay for Life fundraiser at our school. Being a coach, father of 3, husband and teacher I was reluctant to commit to another duty. But this cause was personal to me. My mother lost her life to ovarian cancer a couple years before.

Teaching at a small, K-5 school in a rural community, during tough economic times, I knew it would be a challenge to raise funds. I had to engage my students for this event to take-off. Therefore, I allowed the students to come up with an idea of what they would like to see me do if we met our goal for the fundraiser, which I set at $10,000.00.

The students tossed around several ideas and came up with the idea that I had to sleep on the roof of the school, if the $10,000 goal was met. This idea was published throughout the school community.

As funds started rolling in and people became involved, a local business agreed to match what the school raised. Amazingly, this small community rallied behind this cause and we surpassed our goal. We raised the most of any business or organization in our county despite being the smallest of nine schools.

I was humbled by the generosity and compassion of our students, staff and community. True to my word on the night of our May Day festival, I slept on the roof of the school. My principal even agreed to stay with me due to the overwhelming response by our community. We spent all night on that roof talking about education issues, politics and of course sports. We even had parents coming by at 2 am to check on us and bring coffee.

This was one of the most rewarding experiences during my 20 years in education. I learned to never lower my expectations and always aim high no matter what situation we are in.