We’re back again with another Alumni Spotlight!
Meet Jenn Scarborough! She graduated in 2017 and during her time on ECDM, was a dancer, the Fundraising Coordinator, and the Volunteers’ Committee Lead!
Q: What inspires you to be FTK?
A: I got involved as a freshman because I wanted to make friends, very cliche. My freshman year, just before dance marathon, my sister was admitted to a CMN hospital and was treated there and all of a sudden it went from, “someone please like me in college” to this very personal thing of, “now I totally understand what this is about”. My first year, I wasn’t super involved, I think I raised the minimum for the event, I didn’t really go to a lot of the other events, and then I had this really life changing experience and understanding what they did to care for her, for me, for my mom, how much they followed up with her after she was out of the hospital, what kind of true all encompassing care she was getting so not just medicine. And the example I always give, I was talking to my sister at the hospital one day and she told me they give her strawberry ice cream and she was excited for ice cream this morning and she realized if she was excited for ice cream, she could maybe feel other excitement again and maybe this is going to be okay. And it was this moment that it wasn’t the medicine, it wasn’t the doctors, it wasn't the therapy, all of that is important, all of that she got, but it was the human kindness that the hospital provided. And someone at the Rhode Island dance marathon danced for her and that’s why Hasbro Children’s Hospital has strawberry ice cream, is us. That was really the moment things fell into place for me, that I could give that to someone here.
Q: Favorite Memory or Miracle Moment of ECDM?
A: My senior year I got to run in with Emily and go cut off wristbands with her, the picture is my laptop background. Me and Emily cut off Emma’s band, and she was the fundraising coordinator after me and it was this very circular moment that I was the fundraising coordinator and I passed it down to Emma when I was a senior and she took over and then we got to cut the band as I was leaving and it was very nice curtain on my senior year. It was very emotional, I cried a lot. There’s so many good memories. I’ve made so many friends through this organization, like some of my closest friends to this day are from dance marathon.
Q: Why should others on campus be involved in ECDM?
A: There is always the cliche, it’s part of a bigger cause, you’re helping someone other than yourself. There’s a lot of bad things going on now, the world feels a little bit dark and its really hard and this is a moment of light; this is something good. There’s a lot of things that are too big for us to change but every one of us can give $5, every one of us can give an hour and that’s enough. A diaper is 50 cents, socks are a dollar. Everyone one of us has the power to drastically change a child’s life. There’s so many bad things right now, that just that one moment is enough, at least for me, to start beating back against that tide and make some good in the world that needs a little bit of hope.
Q: What ways have you continued to be FTK even as an alum?
A: I went and did this in grad school at Tufts, I was the graduate student liaison there and brought a lot of our traditions we have here to Tufts. I ran the half marathon for CMNH in Disney last year which was super fun. I am the captain of the 2017 alumni team this year. I fundraise still and I actually just hit $7,000 in seven years last week!
Q: What is one thing you would want to tell a first-year student about ECDM or just dance marathon in general?
A: I think the biggest thing is it seems so easy to be dismissive, to be like, it is fun, is it worth it, do I want to stay up all night; the moment of the kids coming in in the morning the reward is so much greater if you stay the whole night. There’s the line in Hamilton, “If you stand for nothing, what do you fall for?”, if you stand for them it feels so much more meaningful when they walk in and you can literally say, I have physically stood up for you, this person directly in front of me. If you just give yourself that chance one year, it’s very hard to not do it again. And it feels so hard at 4 a.m. to think it’s going to be worth it in a few hours, because it hurts, you’re tired, the gym gets emptier and emptier. Everyone enjoys it in the morning but the people who stayed just get an entirely different experience, and you never forget it and you’re forever changed by it. It just made me a fundamentally better person.
