Author: matt Kianka

We know this isn’t how you imagined your year going — we didn’t, either! But despite the uncertainty of the world right now, we know we will get through this because we are in it together. Just because you are physically distancing doesn’t mean you can’t make a difference.

That’s why we challenge YOU to push your limits, accomplish your goals and raise crucial funds for cancer research and patient-care programs at Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center. This will pass, but our patients still need you and your support – now more than ever before.

How It Works:

1. Pick your challenge and set your goals
2. Click here to create your challenge fundraising page 
3. Collect pledges and donations toward your goal
4. Set a date to complete your challenge by
5. Feel good about all you’ve accomplished – you did something to make a difference!

Challenge Ideas

What is your challenge? Well, that’s completely up to you! Our Team Roswell community is innovative, dedicated and creative, so we encourage you to turn your passions and hobbies into a fundraiser to support cancer patients. Not sure where to start? Here are some ideas so you can make a difference at home:

• Step Up Your Step Game – Set a goal for yourself to take 10,000 steps every day while physically distancing. And challenge your donors to make a $1 donation for every mile you walk. Whether you’re walking outside or on the treadmill, rack up those miles.
• The 100 Challenge – Challenge yourself to do 100 push ups in a day, hold a 100 second plank every day or run 100 miles from start to finish. We believe in you! Push yourself and challenge your donors.
• Live Stream Your Passions – Are you an avid gamer? Create a fundraising page and share it with your followers every time you stream on Twitch. Add fun twists to your efforts – for every $10 donation you’ll do a Fortnite dance!
  
• Show Off Your Skills – Create custom art for a cause and make a piece for your art-loving friend for a donation to your efforts. Spending quarantine learning new recipes? Host a virtual cooking class and ask your family and friends for a donation before tuning in.
  
• Enjoy The Outdoors – Were you registered for an upcoming half-marathon that was postponed? Or maybe you are looking to enjoy the outdoors while physically distancing. Set a goal, get outside and do it! Whatever your “it” is. 

Inspiration

Meet some of our Team Roswell Champions who challenge themselves to make a difference in lives of cancer patients. Read their stories on our blog.

Share on Social Media

When you take on your challenge, don’t forget to post updates and share your progress. Tag Team Roswell so we can cheer you on, too!

#TeamRoswellAtHome
#RoswellStrong

Create A Facebook Fundraiser

Do you have an upcoming birthday? This year, your celebration might feel a little different. Make an impact from home on your birthday by setting up your own Facebook Fundraiser to support the Roswell Park Alliance Foundation. 

Cancer won’t stop – and neither will we. Join us by setting up a Facebook Fundraiser to honor a loved one impacted by cancer. Your efforts will support cancer patients at Roswell Park, who need our help more now than ever before. 

Create A Facebook Fundraiser

We are living in a global event most of us could not have imagined even a few weeks ago. The COVID-19 pandemic has caused unprecedented changes in all our lives, with profound upheavals in family, social, financial and work situations.

And not only is this pandemic affecting our most vulnerable including cancer patients – it has also changed the lives of those that care for them, our health care workers.

Hospitals are rapidly shifting to adapt to the evolving demands of caring for COVID-19 patients, and Roswell Park is no exception.

When you join Team Roswell, during your online page registration you can designate your fundraising toward the Roswell Park COVID-19 Response Fund, which will be used immediately to help our patients and staff in four vital areas.

MEDICAL TREATMENT & RESEARCH

Roswell Park researchers continue to work in close collaboration with cancer centers around the nation. Our researchers are already preparing projects to develop everything from assessment tools to treatments of patients impacted by a global pandemic like COVID-19. Research donations to Roswell’s COVID-19 Response fund will be earmarked for new research studies.

PATIENT FINANCIAL ASSISTANCE THROUGH THE ANGEL FUND

There are times when patients and their families experience extraordinary financial challenges when diagnosed with cancer and undergoing treatment. The impact of COVID-19 makes that financial strain even more debilitating. The Angel Fund provides critical financial support for those we serve who find themselves in sudden and desperate financial circumstances during this pandemic.

STAFF & PATIENT SUPPORT

While there is a self-isolation and work from home mandate from New York State, there are essential clinical staff and patients who have to come to Roswell Park. These individuals do not have a choice during this pandemic but here are several ways this fund seeks to support these individuals during this pandemic. Support of the COVID-19 Response Fund will help purchase:

• iPads for patient communication with loved ones while visitors are limited during the pandemic.
• Meals for frontline caregivers to provide dinner to their family after a long shift.
• Massage chairs in the staff wellness rooms.
• Health monitoring supplies to patients to utilize during telemedicine appointments.

MEDICAL SUPPLIES

N95 masks are an invaluable line of defense for our staff against coronavirus. Support of the COVID-19 Response Fund will help Roswell Park purchase approved masks to quickly get them into the hands of our front line staff to keep them and our patients safe.

While we don’t know how long this current environment will last, we do know there is an immediate need for help. Your support of Roswell Park’s COVID-19 Response Fund during  this new fight, right here at home, will be put to work immediately.

Set Up A Fundraising Page

Donate to the COVID-19 Response Fund

One of the fastest growing fundraising trends is live streaming. You’re probably wondering – what does that mean? Live streaming is the broadcasting of live video over the internet to an audience actively tuning in. Now, add a link to your fundraising page, ask for donations when you go live and voila – now it’s live stream fundraising!

You can turn your passions and hobbies into a fundraiser for cancer cures, whether that is live streaming a cooking class, doing 500 push-ups or playing video games. We truly mean it when we say you can turn anything into a live streaming fundraiser – it just takes a little bit of creativity and passion.

Just ask Josh Piesczynski of Cheektowaga, NY, who has always loved playing video games. He has also had several family members who have been affected by cancer. When he realized that he could combine his love for playing video games and his passion for helping others, Josh created Twitchypeel.

Twitchypeel is Josh’s Twitch persona where he live streams while playing Fortnite and collects donations to support cancer research at Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center.

“I figured why not turn a hobby into something to help others!”

It’s pretty simple – whenever Josh live streams on Twitch, he makes sure to paste his fundraising link into his stream. Then, his audience is able to not only watch and listen to him play, but also make donations to support his efforts. Josh says that he is extremely grateful to be able to fight cancer by doing something that he loves, and is excited for what is next.

For anyone who is considering a live stream fundraiser but might be a little nervous, Josh encourages you to go for it!

“You have nothing to lose and everything to gain from the happiness that fundraising for a cause you care about can bring to others and yourself.”

Josh has raised over $1,000 to date since he started his live streaming fundraiser in the summer of 2019. And he has no plans of stopping with his new goal of $2,500.

You can find Josh on:  

Nothing goes better together than a hot summer day and a refreshing glass of lemonade. Our Team Roswell fundraising coordinators Tim Fitzgerald and his daughters Lena, Maeve and Noreen know that!

We caught up with the Fitzgerald family about the inspiration behind their lemonade stand and how they added a virtual component to boost their fundraising. Here is what they had to say.

What is your connection to Roswell Park?

Roswell Park has been a part of our family’s lives in some way for the past twenty years.  We have had aunts, uncles, cousins and close friends all receive treatment for various types of cancers.  Most closely to our family, both our mother and father had been diagnosed with breast cancer and prostate cancer.  The experiences were vastly different from one another.  In mom’s case, her treatments led to her successfully beating cancer and over the course of the last twenty years through working with Roswell, she has remained cancer free.  Dad was diagnosed with prostate cancer about five years ago, and we quickly learned it was aggressive.  In the eyes of the doctors and professionals working with him, the case was particularly unusual and challenging.  Despite that, the team working with dad continued to develop a treatment plan to keep the cancer at bay.  Towards the end of dad’s journey, he had some major complications but in September of 2018 he was declared cancer free.

In the following month, however, because of the aggressive nature of the cancer and the impact of those complications, dad left us before we were ready to let him go.  No one ever chooses cancer.  Going through the process is extremely difficult.  Even though there is always some level of anxiety when walking through the doors of Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center, every single person we interact with treats us with compassion.  Doctors, nurses, volunteers, and all other members of the community make the process more comforting.  Our family has always been appreciative and grateful for all of the amazing things that happen at Roswell Park.

What inspired you to start this event?

We were inspired to host a lemonade stand for a couple of reasons.  During the long summer days, we needed something to keep us busy and have fun planning!  We decided it might be fun to raise some money for a cause.  The girls are the ones who chose Roswell Park.  They knew that the hospital played an important role in helping not just their grandpa, but also so many other people.  It was a perfect fit for our family because we know how supportive the hospital is not just for those going through treatments, but also their families.

Describe your event and the planning process.

Planning our lemonade stand and incorporating Team Roswell could not have been easier.  Once we decided to host our lemonade stand, we went to the Team Roswell website and set up a fundraising page.  Within 24 hours, a member of Team Roswell personally contacted us, offering support and assistance for our event.  They even sent a great pack of swag to inspire us and help decorate our lemonade stand.  Once we chose the date to host our stand, we used social media to advertise.  We connected our online fundraising page to Facebook through our Team Roswell page to advertise and collect donations. A majority of our donations were made by people buying “virtual lemonade” and it was the reason our event was such a huge success

What does it mean to you to be a champion for cancer cures?

“It’s nice to help your own family but it’s also nice to help others.”
– Maeve

“It feels good knowing that you can play a part in helping raise money for cancer research.”
– Lena

What would you say to someone who is considering starting their own fundraiser but is a little nervous?

“It is ok to feel nervous but once you realize that you are helping Roswell Park, it makes everything easier.  You can pick anything you enjoy doing and turn it into a fundraiser.  It’s also great to get help from your friends to help you feel more confident when getting started.” – Lena and Maeve

Taking the initiative to raise money for a cause can seem like a daunting task.  The structure that Team Roswell has in place makes it incredibly easy to be successful.  The online fundraising platform is very convenient and is a huge reason for our success.

Do you have any fundraising tips and tricks to add?

• Choose something you enjoy and turn it into an opportunity to fundraise.
• Advertise! Let people know about your event.  This is why the Team Roswell Fundraising Page is so great.  It’s easy to post reminders on your donation page.
• Encourage friends and family to “Like” and “Share” your event.  We had many donations from people we did not know because our friends posted our link on their own social media feeds.
• Take advantage of the help and guidance offered by the great people at Team Roswell.  We received t-shirts, stickers, banners, balloons and other items that helped make our event such a success.

Anything else to add?

We are so grateful for Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center.  Everyone knows someone who has experienced cancer.  The impact cancer has not only on the patient, but also his or her family, is significant.  If you choose to be a member of Team Roswell, know that the money you raise, regardless of the amount, has the chance to make someone’s journey with cancer just a little bit better.

At the end of Summer 2019, Lena, Maeve and Noreen presented their check to Team Roswell, and raised an impressive $1,200! Their 2020 lemonade stand is already in the works.

It’s the season of giving! Inspire others and give back this Giving Tuesday by joining Team Roswell.

Get social and create a Facebook fundraiser or use the Instagram Donation Sticker to make an impact on this global day of giving.

Create a Facebook Fundraiser

Starting a fundraiser on Facebook is a quick and easy way to support the Roswell Park Alliance Foundation in just a few easy steps.

• Log in to Facebook
• Click this link to set up a Facebook fundraiser
• Update your fundraiser’s name and description
• Start fundraising!

This year, Facebook will be matching up to $7 million in donations made on Facebook on Giving Tuesday, helping you and the Roswell Park Alliance Foundation make an even greater impact in the fight against cancer!

Use the Instagram Donation Sticker

Another great way to support the Roswell Park Alliance Foundation on Giving Tuesday is through Instagram. With the new donation sticker on Instagram Stories, you can support patients at Roswell Park! Here’s how to do it:

• Save this picture and upload the image into Instagram Stories from your camera roll.

• Click on the sticker icon and the select donation sticker

• Search or select the Roswell Park Alliance Foundation to insert it

• Paste your donation sticker within the box and add to your story

• Watch the donations roll in!

Let’s make this Giving Tuesday the most impactful day for the patients at Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center!

Did you know when you fundraise with Team Roswell, you have the choice to support a specific area that means something to you? One of the areas you can choose to support is the Courage of Carly Fund. By designating your fundraising efforts to support this cause, you are making a difference in the lives of children with cancer and blood disorders at Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center.

How You Can Help

Set up your fundraising page today! Whether you are running a 5k, hosting a lemonade stand or collecting donations to honor a loved one, you can turn your passions, hobbies and special moments into funding for the next lifesaving pediatric cancer treatments. During registration, you can designate your fundraising dollars to pediatric cancer research and patient care programs by selecting “Courage of Carly Fund” from the menu.

See below for an example from our quick and easy registration process:

Click here to set up your fundraising page today!

Carly’s Story

When 8-year-old Carly Collard Cottone was diagnosed with brain cancer, she knew she could make a difference. She was up against something tough, but it was a challenge she faced with courage and optimism.

Carly was so appreciative of the support she received from others while in treatment that she wanted to give back to help other kids like her. So she started Carly’s Club at Roswell Park.

Although Carly was only on this earth a short time, her legacy continues today, giving children facing cancer and blood disorders a fighting chance today through the Courage of Carly Fund at Roswell Park. Providing everything from unforgettable memories and family events to financial support, donations and fundraising efforts allow the Courage of Carly Fund to offer hope and a little bit of extra happiness to children, teens and their families.

Click here to learn more about the Courage of Carly Fund.

Looking to participate in a run/walk for a great cause this summer? Then look no further than the Live.Laugh.LoveYourLungs. 5k Run / 1-Mile Walk! This event is taking place on Sunday, June 2 at Delaware Park and being hosted by Erica Burzynski and Holly Saari of Foundation 228. Proceeds will benefit lung cancer research initiatives at Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center.

Our team at Team Roswell was able to talk to both Erica and Holly about the inspiration behind this event and what participants can expect. Here is what they had to say.

Q: What is the inspiration behind this event?

E: Live.Laugh.LoveYourLungs. 5k Run / 1-Mile Walk this June is the first-ever event for Foundation 228 and we are very excited to have it in our hometown of Buffalo, New York!  Time, talent and local businesses will be tapped to help execute the event, keeping Buffalo at the epicenter of everything we do – where we have nothing but #BuffaLove. We are actively inquiring and pursuing opportunities to help fund in Buffalo and Western New York (and beyond!) that are focused on dedicated lung cancer research.

It is also a day we will forever celebrate our mother’s life, this year being particularly special as it’s our first full year without her. Her love for any city and nature, and taking walks to explore, make Delaware Park Rose Garden and Hoyt Lake a destination fitting for such an event!

How has cancer affected you?

E: I’ve known cancer all my life. I’ve seen family members and friends be diagnosed and live, or lose, but I never understood what it really felt like to lose someone (my mom) and something (our bond) I loved so much until June 2, 2018. It’s absolutely heartbreaking to say goodbye to a parent – someone who loves you unconditionally and is there for all the ups and downs in life. All your firsts you take together, and then as an adult child you are left with a new set of ‘firsts” without the one person you want to share them all with and it’s maddening. I can’t even articulate in words how painful it is to say good bye, but what’s even harder is having to watch someone you love slip away day after day in front of your eyes. And in my mom’s case, as it was lung cancer, it literally took her breath away and I can still hear her whisper ‘Erica Help Me,’ as she struggled to breathe and fear darted out of her eyes and into mine, crushing my heart. I was helpless – not able to offer any comfort constantly pleading and begging doctors for more pain medication with no hope in sight for a medication that might work.

H: Our family is no stranger to cancer.  We’ve had family members and friends suffer from cancer, but when you watch the woman who brought you into this world, struggling to live her life, struggling to breathe, struggling to eat, it becomes a mission to find a cure, to make people aware and be an advocate for them. I hope that one day cancer is something we talk about only in textbooks.

Q: Can you describe your mother? What’s your favorite memory of her?

E: In my eyes, my mom is the epitome of grace, beauty (inside and out), class and warrior-like strength. She was our cheerleader and confidant, but always my mother first and then my friend, which I can appreciate so much more as an adult. She always put my needs before her own, as mothers often do, and taught me how to be humble and proud of my Polish heritage. She sacrificed in order to give me/us our best life. My favorite memory of her would have to be the night before Thanksgiving. We would come home from being out and she would be joyfully baking the pies for Thanksgiving and then Thanksgiving mornings getting the bird in the oven and the rest of us staying out of her way as she finished dinner! We loved to shop – often finding the best deals – and my favorite memory was the moment I put on my senior prom dress at Lord & Taylor – her smile was priceless.

H: My mom was a smart, beautiful, independent, supportive person in all aspects of our lives.  She loved her family and her grandchildren with everything she had to give.  She’d chat for hours with my children while they went about life and this was before FaceTime; our mom just wanted us to be happy.  Don’t get me wrong, we certainly had our disagreements, but we always loved each other enough (like the I Wish You Enough poem by Bob Perks)!  I have so many memories of our mom, but my favorite memories include coming home to Buffalo with my boys from California during the summer.   They were still little and we’d spend a couple of weeks at my parents. They’d fish, and color and just be around my mom and dad.  My mom was in her element, just loving on my boys.  I’m so lucky to have those memories to treasure forever.  I hope it made up for us living so far away most of the year.  It’s just a bit of a different world, that you don’t fully understand until you’re in the midst of it.  She just loved her grandsons.

Why did you decide to do a 5k?

H: For the last several years I’ve found comfort in running, it clears my mind and also keeps me healthy.  When we found out that our mom had cancer, I ran many long miles both on a treadmill and trails as my therapy to help me cope with the road ahead.  I was drawn to Delaware Park and Hoyt Lake during my visits to Buffalo and especially during our mother’s illness. It just felt like a natural event to keep our mother’s spirit alive, while bringing people together to enjoy the lake and the beauty and celebrate our mom.

E: I love to run, it keeps you moving and makes you feel alive! It pushes your limits! 5ks and walks help build community, is exercise/healthy, and helps you build your lung capacity.

What are you most looking forward to?

E: Raising our first one million dollars and contributing to the cure for lung cancer. It would be brilliant if the research we are able to fund helps find a cure for all cancers!

H: I’m looking forward to creating awareness, and funding research so that more families do not have to relive the same horrors that we experienced while our mom fought for her life.  I want white/pearls to be just as important as pink.  I’m looking forward to keeping our mother’s spirit alive through different events to raise money for lung cancer research and awareness.  We’ve only just begun, I know there are so many opportunities just waiting for us, and I can’t wait to just make it all happen with my sister and our families/friends.

Participants can choose to participate in the 5k run, one mile walk, or a virtual run on Sunday, June 2. Hotel Henry will generously donate $1 to Foundation 228 for each beverage ordered on race-day with a race bib. Event day parking has been reserved first come, first serve, at the Buffalo History Museum.

Registration is $30 (registration increases to $35 after May 25) – sign up today!