Fundraising with a purpose
Rankin gymnasts hit the streets for new equipment, suits and travel costs
Darrell Greer
Northern News Services
Wednesday, April 19, 2017
RANKIN INLET
Coaches and athletes of the Aqsarniit Ujauttaq Gymnastics Club have a lot of fundraising to get done during the next 18 months if they want to obtain every item on the club's list during the next two seasons in Rankin Inlet.
Rankin Inlet Aqsarniit Ujauttaq Gymnastics Club member Kylie Mae Aksalnik does her floor routine while competing at the Atlantic Crown Invitational competition in Nassau, Bahamas, in the last gymnastics season. - NNSL file photo |
The young gymnasts are currently out raising funds through a Gym-A-Thon promotion, which sees people get to write down a word or letter when they donate any amount of money to the activity.
Each letter and word corresponds with a specific exercise, which each gymnast has to complete on May 13.
The gymnasts are fundraising for new competitive gymnastics suits, new equipment, and to help with the costs of competition trips for the upcoming season.
Haley White has been helping head coach and club founder Lisa Kresky for a while now and she stepped up to keep things running smoothly while Kresky is in the south for a year on education leave.
White said the club has a lot of kids, and she and Kresky plan to travel quite a bit with them during the next two years.
She said gym equipment is ridiculously priced before you even add the shipping charges to get it to Rankin from the south.
"One thing I really love about the North is how somebody always seems to be fundraising for kids in the community, and our club kids are really excited about the Gym-A-Thon and can't wait to see who has to do the most splits on May 13," said White.
"I don't think they really look upon this as fun, because they get a vigorous workout with this fundraiser, but they're certainly looking forward to doing their share to raise money.
"The kids are great little fundraisers who enjoy trying to raise a lot of money because they always know what they're working towards.
"They're super-excited about getting a new vault, which is something that's desperately needed for our club."
White said some of the young gymnasts are nearing the point where they will soon outgrow what the club has to offer in Rankin.
She said a number of them really should consider attending a gymnastics camp this summer and bringing what they learn there back to Rankin to work on it.
"A lot of the young gymnasts here in Rankin do have a lot of potential.
"They're really excited about us bringing professional gymnastics coach Pam Collett here this year to help both the gymnasts and the coaches get further ahead with their moves and abilities.
"Everyone is also pretty excited about our plans to invest in new competitive gymnastics suits.
"Our current suits are very old, and the new ones are going to have a lot of bling, and they're a very shiny purple that makes them very Northern lights looking, so we're really excited about that."
