This past Saturday, SUNY Geneseo hosted its 13th annual Relay for Life in the Merritt Athletic Center. This was the first year I participated and fundraised with my sorority, Sigma Delta Tau. At first, I didn’t see what good sitting in a gym and walking around a track for 6 hours would do to help cure cancer. But sure enough, after experiencing Relay for Life at Geneseo, I now understand why this is such a helpful and uplifting event.
A couple weeks ago, our sororities Vice President of Philanthropy sent out an email and asked us to share a relay donation link on our Facebooks and ask around for donations. I was uncertain whether or not I would get any donations from any of my Facebook friends, so I also sent out a text to a couple of relatives. I was surprised when I ended up raising over two hundred dollars for Relay. Fundraising is a very important part of Relay for me because, I, like many people know a loved one that has been and/or being affected by cancer. Although two hundred dollars isn’t a ton of money, combined with the rest of Geneseo’s campus, we raised about 160,000 dollars to go towards finding a cure and having more birthdays to celebrate.
This experience has taught me that even the little things like walking around a track, buying a water bottle, or just listening to people’s stories at relay can really make a difference and have an impact. The feeling of having pretty much the entire Geneseo student body and staff at relay hits home and creates a sense of unity and leaves everyone better off in the long run. I believe relay brings the entire campus community together and that if we all work together things can become accomplished better and more efficiently.
Similarly, in our INTD class, there are a number of class periods when we work together in groups to try and accomplish a greater outcome than we would individually. Whether it’s combining multiple essays into one or just sharing our ideas with each other, I feel like I come out more knowledgeable and it makes the class seem more doable.
The Geneseo GLOBE statement recognizes that one of its learning outcomes is “Leadership and Collaboration”. Geneseo encourages its students to come together to create a more effective outcome. Supporting each other is such an important part of succeeding not only in Geneseo but after graduation.