Anna Bialkowski & Emaretta Branham
The Southern Editor & Staff Writer
Dance Marathons have happened all across the country. At FSC, the event first came to campus spring of 2023 as an initiative to raise money for children with cancer, especially supporting the Children’s Miracle Network at Johns Hopkins All Children’s Hospital in St. Petersburg.
Executive Director of this initiative Chloe Lanham has helped bring Dance Marathon back to campus after a short hiatus last year.
“Dance Marathon first started as an SGA initiative back in 2023 by Carter Webb and Ruby Silver,” Lanham said. “They were the ones that kind of took the lead in it.”
The organization’s first year hosting the event was successful, recognized by Dance Marathon as the fifth-best 2023 Top Collegiate First-Year Program for raising $16,995.
Florida Southern isn’t the only school that helps raise money for Children’s Miracle Network; the Dance Marathon website states over 400 universities, colleges and high schools raise money for the same cause.
The people who attend these events, though, range.
“I believe we had about 12 or 15 people attending total,” Lanham said. “We also had two patient families from John Hopkins that did attend. One of them came in person, the other we had on Zoom.”
FSC’s Dance Marathon event revolved around the theme “Level Up” which included several video game-related games, such as Just Dance. Participants could also request songs and a few line dances were taught to the group.
“You can pick your favorite song,” Lanham said. “We did song requests throughout the night. We taught a few line dances too, just to get everybody on their feet since it is a Dance Marathon.”
The moment during the night that resonated with Lanham was hearing from patients Marina and Nikki, who spoke at the event in person.
“[Marina and Nikki] were talking a lot about how they went to other hospitals and the doctors would tell them ‘no’ about finding a cure for her illness,” Lanham said.
Looking into the future, Lanham wants to make Dance Marathon a campus-wide event and partner with more organizations to spread the mission of the initiative. She explained that while Dance Marathon started as an SGA initiative, Dance Marathon ended up becoming its organization.
In 2023, Dance Marathon had significant support from the Sigma Alpha Epsilon (SAE) brothers, whose fraternity shares the same philanthropy as Dance Marathon. With several sororities and fraternities sharing similar philanthropies to help children in need, Lanham is optimistic about forming partnerships next spring.
“I’d love to make [Dance Marathon] bigger and better,” Lanham said. “I’d love to get a bunch of Green organizations involved. I know several of our Greek organizations on campus do have connections to children’s hospitals or their philanthropy is something around helping children.”
Lanham also expresses interest in working with ACE (Association of Campus Entertainment), SGA and a diverse set of campus organizations to raise more money through Dance Marathon.
