The Phi Theta chapter of Tri Delta served up lemonade on the concourse on Sept. 9 to spread awareness for childhood cancer.
Members of the sorority handed out lemonade to students and took donations for the Alex's Lemonade Stand Foundation. The event was free to attend. Students received lemonade while walking on the concourse and had the opportunity to donate to the charity.
Amanda Carter, the vice president of administration for Tri Delta and senior in animal sciences, said this event has been going on for years on Auburn's campus.
"Nationally, every chapter supports St. Jude's Children Research Hospital," Carter said. "But our chapter has decided to take on Alex's Lemonade Stand as well because the money goes to childhood cancer."
Carter said September is childhood cancer awareness month.
"If anything, we just want to make sure people are aware of the disease that is childhood cancer," Carter said. "It does affect so many, and the majority of cancer research funding does not go to children. It goes to adults and just the general population."
McKenna Leahy, Tri Delta member and junior in nursing, said this event goes hand in hand with the sorority's campaign, "I wear gold because..."
"All of our sisters post on Instagram and on different social media [outlets] why they support childhood cancer," Leahy said. "It's really cool just to see how big it gets and people really follow along with it."
Carter said "people always have a story" to share when it comes to how cancer has affected their life.
"They have a neighbor from home, they have a cousin, they know someone who knows someone," Carter said. "it's really cool to see like people speak up and come out of the woodwork to say 'Hey, it means a lot that y'all are doing this' because so and so that I know was really affected by this.'"
Maddie Gathings, junior in nursing, said her story of how she got involved with raising money and awareness for childhood cancer began when she was 16.
"My boyfriend at the time was diagnosed with stage four osteosarcoma bone cancer and so our world completely changed," Gathings said. "Of course I'd heard of cancer, and I had a family member who had one, but specifically not in childhood and this is just such a different area."
Gathings, who recently started the Miss Alabama preliminaries and is now Miss Tennessee Valley, came out to suppot Alex's Lemonade Stand as part of her platform, "When Life Gives you Lemons."
"[Childhood cancer] is underfunded," Gathings said. "Only four percent of our government funding goes toward pediatric cancer."
According to Carter, the sorority hopes to raise $1000 from the event.
Do you like this story? The Plainsman doesn't accept money from tuition or student fees, and we don't charge a subscription fee. But you can donate to support The Plainsman.
