FEATURE

12½ Year Old Madeleine Calvo Raises $1,550 for Marsha Rivkin Center

Madeleine Calvo isn't your typical 12½ year old. For her Bat Mitzvah project, she wanted to make a difference. Madeleine and her family were touched by the loss of a close family friend, Babs Fisher, to ovarian cancer. Madeleine decided to honor the woman she affectionately remembers as "Auntie Babs" through a swim-a-thon to raise funds for research.

Madeleine is part of a swim group that meets for 1½ hours 4 days a week to swim laps and perform vigorous drills. The young girls and boys have been swimming together for the past 3 years and have become a very tight-knit group of friends. When the time came to tell her teammates about her project, it was received with much excitement. Everyone reached out to their friends and family to collect either a flat donation or pledge for every lap they swam at the event.

On the day of the swim-a-thon, volunteers counted laps (50 meters=2 laps). Each lane had 3-4 swimmers that continuously swam for over 1 hour and 15 minutes. In the end, the group swam a total of 51,540 meters. The average individual swam 90 or more laps and Madeleine alone swam 150 laps. They raised an astonishing $1,550.00 in memory of Babs Fisher!

Madeleine recently presented this generous donation to the Marsha Rivkin Center. During the check presentation, she stated "I know this is an important cause to my family and it has been rewarding working on this project."

The Marsha Rivkin Center is truly humbled by Madeleine's generosity.