I am absolutely thrilled and blown away to tell you that we have raised 5.5 million cfa so far from participants and sponsors in Swim for Health/Medecins Sans Frontières in West Africa. That is almost twice as much as the 3 million cfa we had hoped to raise, and there are still some donations yet to be collected. Dakar Women's Group had pledged to match up to 3 million cfa in contributions, which means a total contribution of at least 8.5 million cfa to Medecins Sans Frontieres for their work fighting Ebola in West Africa. There are several people who made this all possible, but the first was ISD Director Alan Knobloch, who was 100 percent into the idea of co-sponsoring with DWG as soon as I suggested it. Facilities Manager and swim coach John Andrews, besides calling in enough markers from his swimming buddies worldwide that the ISD Coaches team tallied the highest total of sponsorship, also advised our event organizers based on his experience of many a swimming competition. The total handed over to me from ISD Coaches -- John, Murray TeHuki, Kevin Leinbach, and Jodie Roderick -- was 790,000 cfa. The student group at ISD that contributed the most money was Les Franco Requins, swimming 35 laps in 15 minutes. Maryelle Faye's 6th graders contributed 442,500 cfa. Many thanks to Mme. Faye and Diana Mbama, Karel Sow, Ines Ladjal, Leon Bourdeaux, Alane Mane, Danae IseKouras, and all of their friends and sponsors. Two sisters from Dakar Academy, Davida and Jemma, swam the most laps for an individual, child or adult, a total of 69 laps in two separate lanes. I'm not sure if they matched each other or if one swam a few more than the other, but either way, at least one of them outdid everyone else. Thank you, thank you for your support. Sharon Nossiter, President, Dakar Women's Group |
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