News : Vikettes celebrate success of breast cancer fund-raising efforts

Pink Night success: VIkette coach Deb Hanneman presents Monica Stark of VGH a check for $1,500.

A project that started as a show of support for a Vinton-Shellburg High School teacher facing breast cancer has grown into an annual fund-raising event that is also largely responsible for the creation of the local Breast Cancer Survivors group.

On Tuesday morning, the members of the VSHS Vikettes girls basketball team presented a check for $1,500 to Monica Stark of the Virginia Gay Hospital Imaging Services Department, which began offering mammograms this year. In the past three years, the Vikettes have raised a total of $3,700 toward the fight against breast cancer.

The fund-raising efforts by the Vikettes and many other community members and organizations has helped fund the renovation of the mammography room at VGH. Donations have also made available $6,000 in funds to provide mammograms for women who cannot afford them, said Stark. That amount will cover more than 150 mammograms, she said.

Lois Mulvaney, the VSHS French teacher, was diagnosed with cancer in 2008. Many students still have wear t-shirts that read “Nous Sommes Avec Toi,” which is French for “We are with you.”

Coach Deb Hanneman said that there was a small breast cancer awareness event during the 2008-2009 school year. That event was so surprisingly successful that Hanneman and Mindy McClintock organized a more formal event and invited the survivors, many of whom are relatives, friends or neighbors of the players.

Janet Woodhouse, a survivor and also the VSHS girls golf coach, said that when the survivors gathered together at the high school during that first “Pink Night,” they realized that they should get together more often to share their stories and help each other.

“That event became the impetus for our group,” said Woodhouse.

Coach Hanneman says the events are so successful because of the community involvement. The willingness of the breast cancer survivors to participate, as well as the eagerness of VSHS students and their families, and Viking/Vikette fans, to join the effort has made the Pink Night one of the highlights of the school year.

“It’s very inspiring,” said Coach Woodhouse. “The students are just remarkable. They got all of us survivors together.”