A high school education is all about awareness.
Awareness of the reading, writing and arithmetic that mark the foundation of all things academic.
Awareness of the world around us, the opportunities that await and the challenges to be faced.
Many of those challenges seem far removed from the average teenager, but typically they are only a degree or two of separation away.
The battle against breast cancer is one of the more prominent health challenges in today’s society, but athletic-minded high school kids may not see the direct threat of the disease as they complete practice drills or run miles in the spirit of fitness.
Yet often it looms perilously nearby — with a relative, family friend, or even a coach.
Like Central of Corinth girls basketball and field hockey coach Diane Rollins or Orono field hockey coach Dodie Saucier, breast cancer survivors who shared a special afternoon with comrades in competition at the Union Street Recreation Park in Bangor on Wednesday.
Both Rollins and Saucier threw out a ceremonial first pitch before Central and John Bapst of Bangor met in a “Pink Softball Game” to aid the fight against breast cancer.
“It meant a lot to me,” said Rollins, who learned of her diagnosis a year ago during basketball season, but more recently has received a clean bill of health. “Having my connection with the school and being a coach, it made me feel good that the kids were interested in something that made them really think outside their school community.”
The bases were pink, as were the baselines for this regular-season game. John Bapst players presented their Central counterparts pink T-shirts before the game, and both teams wore pink as they played.
“We wanted to have a little fun with it,” said John Bapst coach Shannon Whiting, a wellness and physical education teacher at the school who modeled the event after similar public awareness activities held in other sports. “The girls saw the pink bases and the pink baselines and I remember one saying ‘playing in pink, that’s a little girl’s dream.’”
Donations totaling $279 were collected during the game, and Central coach Durice Washburn presented Whiting a check for $368 for a total of $647 to be given to the Kay Yow/Women’s Basketball Coaches Association Cancer Fund and the Jimmy V Foundation in the names of the two teams.
“This seemed like an appropriate thing to do,” said Whiting. “Having two women’s teams here with two women coaches, it was a good chance to raise some money and raise some awareness.
“The very first day I met with the kids and told them what I had in mind, they thought it was a wonderful idea, what a great way to send a message.”
That same message likely will be sent out again next spring, as Whiting and Washburn already have talked about holding a similar event, perhaps with Central as the host school.
Rollins, for one, sees how expanding such awareness can be valuable to the learning experience — which, after all, is what education is all about.
“Sometimes I think when we make kids aware of some of the bad things out there, and I think of cancer as a bad thing, they can grow from it,” she said. “You talk about ‘this is what the situation is and what we can do about it,’ and as they learn more and more I think it can help them become better people.”
eclark@bangordailynews.net
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