Fifth annual RhodyThon raised almost 46,000 dollars for Hasbro Children’s Hospital. PHOTO CREDIT: uri.edu
The University of Rhode Island’s fifth annual RhodyTHON dance competition took place on Saturday, March 25, raising almost $46,000 in donations to support young patients at Hasbro Children’s Hospital.
RhodyTHON is a student-led and student-run dance competition that spans from eight to 10 hours. It is also a nonprofit organization that holds events throughout the academic year.
Sophia Agbay, a second-year student studying psychology, criminology and political science and onstage chair for the executive board for RhodyTHON, said URI’s version of a “THON” is different from other schools.
“RhodyTHON is the University of Rhode Island’s version of a THON, which supports the Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals all across the country,” Agbay said. “There are dozens of schools that take part in their own versions of THON. For our specific THON, we work with Hasbro Children’s Hospital in Providence.”
Agbay said RhodyTHON also fundraises throughout the year, but this is their biggest event. Traditionally, the dance challenge lasts 24 hours, however, they cut the event down to around eight to 10 hours for students.
The miracle families and children are invited to this event, where the members of RhodyTHON honor them all day long and they also dedicate each hour to one of the children. They get to walk up with a special song and have their stories told, according to Agbay.
Grace Heppes, a third-year student majoring in clinical neuroscience with a minor in leadership studies and executive director of RhodyTHON, explained what the money raised goes towards when they give it to Hasbro after the event.
The money also goes towards medical bills so some of the families get financial relief for their child’s treatments. Additionally, the hospital itself splits the money up however they want and use it for whatever they need, Heppes said.
“It goes towards new technology, actually we’ve raised over $600,000 since 2018,” Heppes said. “And that money has gone towards, I don’t know how much of it, a but some of it has gone towards building a wing in the hospital and it’s actually dedicated to us, there’s a plaque for RhodyTHON in the wing of the hospital that was built using money that we raised.”
According to Heppes, it was hard coming back from the pandemic and doing this event in person without any COVID-19 restrictions.
Heppes talked about the importance of RhodyTHON and how she believes the event brings a different perspective to people, especially college students, and helps them realize how much children with a medical illness go through in terms of treatments and surgeries in such little time.
“We had 10 miracle kids, and I believe seven were able to come,” Heppes said. “We had Amelia who is currently going through chemo and I think we were kind of expecting her to be kind of low energy and she was running around like crazy, like smile from ear to ear. She was bouncing balloons back with like frat boys who were 10 times her size. It was adorable.”
In regards to being involved in her sorority, Chi Omega, who’s national philanthropy is the Make-a-Wish foundation, which raises money for children with critical illnesses and RhodyTHON, Agbay said that for students that don’t have a reason for why they’re involved with this organization yet, they will find one eventually. She said that being a part of these organizations has given her so many “reasons why.”
“I played baseball with one of our miracle kids Tyler for like so long,” Agbay said. “We let Paige paint our faces. And just seeing these kids and hearing their stories, that is my reason why, because I want to do better for these kids. I want them to be able to have the best lives possible no matter what they have been through looking forward. I hope there is clear blue skies forever. And it is an honor for me to be able to say that I’m a part of this.”
Heppes and Agbay said that they were both happy with the amount of people that came to the event to support the children. They expressed that this event means so much to both of them and they love fundraising for these children to give them a better life and better treatment to fight their diseases.