A week ago yesterday, we were all in a panKATE & sausage stupor, sleeping off our efforts into the late afternoon. There were so many people who worked SO hard to make our PanKATE breakfast official launch party a tremendous success and I will dedicate an entire seprate post to them and to recaping the event itself.
I wanted to write this post to give you, Kate’s Cause followers, an idea of exactly WHAT Kate’s Cause is, anyway?? You’ve been so supportive of us and of our family, and I felt like this was a good way to tell everyone what we shared that day at the launch event.
Over the last 17 months, we’ve alluded to our mission and our goals and how we want to be involved in this community, but now, with the launch party officially, well, LAUNCHED, and our website live & in color, I want to take a moment to recap for you exactly what Kate’s Cause IS. What it MEANS. And where your generous donations and contributions will go.
I’ve been asked time after time how Mike & I we could really do this – start a foundation geared toward helping children with cancer when our very own would never benefit from the work that we have planned. Trust me – I’ve questioned it a billion times myself. But do you know what I realized? She WILL benefit. For every child who smiles because of a prize donated from our toy drive…Kate smiles. For every new person who learns a little bit more about childhood cancer because of our awareness efforts….Kate celebrates. And for every dollar we raise to fund research for better treatments so that other children might be spared some of the harshest of realities…Kate rejoices. Every time someone tells her story, she lives on. Truly, this cause is for them. Because of her.
Kate’s Cause has an ambitious mission ahead with three goals.
FIRST: To raise awareness! Currently, the federally funded National Cancer Institute only allocates 4% of its annual budget to research for childhood cancers. Small organizations such as ours cannot do it alone. We NEED the government to help make our children a national priority and provide MORE THAN FOUR! We aim to be deeply involved in the advancement of the awareness movement. If over time we do nothing else, raising awareness about THE MOST IMPORTANT CAUSE is of the utmost importance. While we celebrate the way Kate LIVED, we also need to remind people of WHY she died and why 7 children die each day.
SECOND: to raise funds for research! We want to support the most promising prospects in pediatric oncology research: for better and less toxic treatments for the kids in treatment today and for the kids who will be diagnosed tomorrow.
We are excited to announce what is currently being called “Katie’s Grant…” an annual grant opportunity for Young Investigators, which we hope will fulfill the need for startup funds for less experienced researchers to pursue promising research ideas. Applicants will apply during their fellowship or early in their research careers. With this funding, we hope to encourage the most promising research for targeted and immunotherapies, by the brightest researchers of the future, that will lead to long-term discoveries. The first grant will be awarded on Kate’s birthday in 2018.
THIRD: to give back to the pediatric cancer community. We want to support the community that so wholeheartedly embraced us through various donations, drives and activities for Kate’s beloved clinic, The Pediatric Specialists of Virginia Center for Cancer and Blood Disorders and her treatment hospital, Inova Children’s Hospital.
Our toy drive was a tremendous thanks to YOU! We were able to donate over 500 toys and gifts to our clinic and hospital in Kate’s name. There will be other clinic-based events in our future, so stay tuned about that.
So what else does launching this cause officially mean? Well, for one…our website is obviously LIVE! Keep up to date on upcoming events, registration for future fun and other more specific details about all the goings on. Our work will continue on the grant process in the coming months as we conult with Robin on the details. I will continue to post on our Facebook page but will probably save the lengthier posts for this blog, where I hope to return to writing a little more heartily. We will also share ways that YOU can be involved, such as joining us for Cure Fest this September and learning how you can advocate for our kids by supporting important legislation such as the RACE for Children Act.
We hope you will stay tuned with us as we further our plans. Thank you so much for believing in us and for supporting us.
Welcome to kate’s Cause. We’re so glad you’re here.