The fifth year is the charm for Ball State University Dance Marathon, which raised more than $87,000 on Saturday for Riley Hospital for Children's Magic Castle cart and new Palliative Care program, which helps families deal with life altering injuries and diseases. They well surpassed their goal of $60,000.
Compared to last year's results, with only about 400 dancers and raising a little more than $39,000, Ball State managed to nearly double both the dancers, with 719 this year, as well as the donation.
A human tunnel of cheering students stretched the length of the gym welcoming Evan Meade to the fifth annual marathon. As he made his entrance with the 15 other Riley families attending the dance marathon, the announcer dubbed him "cool as a cucumber."
That is an apt way to describe Meade, as the senior at Franklin Community High School made his way to the stage.
Having already experienced about 20 dance marathons at Indiana University, Butler University, Ball State and various high schools, Meade has seen it all. But he still said Ball State is his favorite.
"Ball State is by far the best dance marathon that I've ever been to," Meade said. "Just the passion that is behind, not only the exec people, but all the kids, all the dancers. It's something special."
National Director of Dance Marathon Zac Johnson came from Salt Lake City to "give up" his weekend in Indiana, where his dance marathon career started, Johnson said in his speech during opening ceremony. Even though the majority of the crowd raised their hand for being first timers to the marathon, Johnson seemed to agree with Meade, and had nothing but praise for Ball State.
"You guys get it," Johnson said. "The spirit of dance marathon is nationwide. Ball State is at its heart."
That heart could be seen just by looking around the room. Ball Gymnasium was transformed for the event, complete with a bouncy house, privacy tents and cloth posters hanging from the track, surrounding the dancers. Cheers of "FTK", for the kids, rang through the building. The only thing that couldn't be found was a chair, supporting the mission statement "We dance for those who can't."
But the real heart of the event started even before the decorations were placed. The BSUDM executive board made a point of getting to know each Riley family before the event.
"They really made it a point to go beyond," Meade said. "They all came down ... for football this year and came and supported me. Just those different things they do that take it past what everyone else does, that special connection they've made with my family and I. We've just gotten so close to them these past few years coming to the dance marathon."
Meade spent January 2010 to September 2010 in Riley fighting acute myeloid leukemia. He said what Riley has taught him the most is to cherish these friendships, whether they are with dance marathon executives, other patients or doctors and nurses.
"It's something that cancer will never be able to take away from us," Meade said. "We will always have our friendship. That is something I will never take for granted."
One of the friendships that Meade still keeps up today is with one of his fellow Riley patients.
"There was a little girl named Keely. At the time she was 2, and she had Down Syndrome but she also had leukemia, the same thing that I did," Meade said. "I remember my first round, I was down in the ICU in a coma for 40 days and when I came back up she was actually the first person in my room."
Because they started treatment around the same time, they were in Riley together.
"Every day, she would manage to find me and boss me around," Meade said. "She really got close to my family and I, and we've stayed really close. She has seven brothers and when she was at Riley, she didn't really have all of those brothers she was used to seeing every day, so I think I kind of filled that role."
It is stories like these that served as inspiration for the dancers who spent 12 hours standing.
The dancers were organized into teams: red, green, purple, blue, orange and pink.
The blue team, which included 32 registered dancers from Alpha Chi Omega, sponsored a little girl named Molly Hess.
"[Molly] loves princesses and unicorns," Paige Daniel, a sophomore elementary education major, said. "She couldn't come last year, so we are excited to meet her."
Daniel had been looking forward to the marathon since last year. Of the 12 Alpha Chi Omegas that participated last year, two joined the BSUDM committee for this year, which helped to get more of the sorority involved, Daniel said.
Alexa Gates is one of the 12 girls who joined morale this year.
"Morale's job is to make sure our team is having a good time," Gates said. "We got here at 9 to go through the logistics. Then they let us go home and get ready, and come back hopefully with more energy."
There are 25 morale members, assigned by color. Gates was assigned to the pink team. For her, BSUDM was much different than what she had experienced in high school. She said there were more people, more energy and more money raised.
"I don't think any of those kids out there will understand the amount of impact they are going to have just dancing and raising that money," Meade said. "How many people that will affect whether it goes to research or different treatments or whatever. It's to make a difference."
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