I don’t have much of a sense of rhythm; I don’t particularly like dance music. Honestly, I don’t like dancing much at all. Good, now we’ve got that out of the way. My name is Connor Gentry and I am a junior at Hope studying engineering. I am now in my second year as a …
Author Archives: Camryn Peterson
Guest Blog- Carrie Dattels
I promised to do this months ago, but I’ve been putting it off. It’s not that I don’t want to share, I’m just not certain what I should share. We are still searching for an answer to Jillian’s medical problems. Medicine is not an exact science until, I suppose, you get to genetic testing, which …
Student Blog- Libby Rieman “18K Day”
I had a revelation tonight. I’ve always known I dance for something bigger, for something more than myself, but tonight when we raised $18,000 in one day and then broke $100,000, it hit me. I was writing a letter to my parents and I had this moment and I just knew why it was all …
Student Blog- Seth Mika
“I didn’t begin my pregnancy journey thinking it would end with our baby in the NICU. Having a baby 6 weeks early was a very stressful experience. However, we couldn’t have been in a better hospital. The NICU is a very secured area. Every morning, I scanned my badge and signed my name in the …
Guest Blog-Peltier Family
11 years ago, we found out we were expecting and I was so excited. I was very sick throughout the whole pregnancy. In and out of the hospital. At 14 weeks, I was diagnosed with severe preeclampsia and HELLP syndrome which basically hit the major organs in the mother the only way to cure it …
Student Blog- Heidi Schaetzl
Hello friend!!! My name is Heidi Schaetzl and I’m a junior studying math elementary education. I hope to someday start a Dance Marathon program in the school where I teach, and someday to be a teacher in a children’s hospital for the kids who are there long term. I will drag every person I can …
Student Blog-Caitie Kieser
Hi hi!! My name is Caitie Kieser and I am a Junior at Hope studying Social Work. Asking me to write only one short blog about Dance Marathon and include every piece that I love and every way I have been impacted would quite literally be impossible. I would need more of a 20 part …
Guest Blog- Amy Berarducci
Would I ever wish for our family (or any family) to go through what we did?…Absolutely not. Do I think it changed us for the better as human beings?…Absolutely Mia’s story started when she was 1.5 years old (2005). She was having trouble walking, frequently falling more than a typical toddler, eye movements, screaming and …
Student Blog-Seth Held
Hello! My name is Seth Held and I am a junior studying public accounting here at Hope College. It wasn’t until my second semester freshmen year that I really started to learn about Dance Marathon. After witnessing the enormous and selfless support for both families and the Helen DeVos Children’s Hospital provided by Hope College …
Guest Blog- Sam Starks
The Fear of Fundraising “I just don’t like asking people for money.” The single thought suffocating our mind when we think about fundraising. But this thought only touches the surface of the one major dilemma holding us back. We struggle with one thing: what other people think about us. The good thing is that the …