Invisible Children holds Honor Roll dance to raise funds for Uganda

This semester, MU’s chapter has raised more than $1,410.

By Jimmy Hibsch

Published Dec. 11, 2010

Children in Uganda will be reaping the benefits of about 25 students’ night of dancing at “Honor Roll: A Dance Party Benefit for Schools in Uganda” Tuesday evening at the Blue Note.

The national Invisible Children organization has a contest every fall semester called Schools for Schools. For the contest, each of the 1,141 Invisible Children chapters at schools across the country are raising money for their respective sister schools in Uganda.

Planned by seniors Emily Becker and Brittany Toon, Honor Roll was the MU chapter’s latest effort to collect funds for this contest.

“We were trying to come up with an event that would both raise money and raise awareness of our organization on campus,” Becker said. “We’re kind of a small organization and we’d like more people to get involved.”

Because the organization is small, it paired with charity: water at Mizzou, a student organization aiming to bring clean and safe drinking water to people in developing nations. President Kiki Schmitz said charity: water at Mizzou has a similar competition like Schools for Schools, so she was happy to help Invisible Children with the event.

“I know that Invisible Children’s and charity: water’s goals tend to overlap,” Schmitz said. “It was great to be able to team up for a good cause.

Funds from the night will be sent to Gulu Senior Secondary, a school of 1,674 in Uganda. So far, the 78 schools raising money for this specific school will donate $39,148. Of this, MU’s chapter has gathered $1,410. In MU’s cluster, Kickapoo High School in Springfield has raised the most -- $4,429.91.

Nationally, $628,069.89 has been raised and the Schools for Schools competition ends Dec. 17.

Although she didn’t have definite numbers on how much Invisible Children will make from Honor Roll, Becker said the organization sold more than $100 in T-shirts alone.

“This is the first time that we’ve ever attempted anything like this, so the fact that we planned it all in about a month was a big thing for us,” Becker said.

Both Becker and Toon said they had hoped for more people to show up to the event, but were still pleased with its outcome nonetheless.

“We definitely would have liked more people to be there, but it might have been because of the time and the weather,” Becker said. “But it was still a success for us.”

Toon seconded Becker’s thoughts.

“The turnout was obviously a little smaller than we expected, but we’re not at all disappointed with how the night went,” Toon said.

Despite the small turnout, Becker said she and the rest of the participants enjoyed the night.

“I had a really fun time and the people who were there seemed to have a really good time,” Becker said. “That enough was a success overall.”

As this was Invisible Children’s first event of this type, but Becker said there are more to come in the future.

“Now we know a little bit more about how to do this kind of thing, so there will definitely be more events in the future,” Toon said.

Invisible Children will wrap up this semester’s fundraising efforts with a holiday wreath auction at 6 p.m. Saturday at McAlister’s Deli.

Toon, Schmitz and Becker are all former members of The Maneater staff.