Black Friday and Cyber Monday have become synonymous with Thanksgiving and almost everyone is aware of what goes on in stores and online during these two days. What about Giving Tuesday? Not as many people have heard about this global day of giving and we are here to help spread the word! Giving Tuesday is celebrated on the Tuesday after Thanksgiving and aims to kick off and promote charitable work during the holiday season. Created by the Belfer Center for Innovation & Social Impact in 2012, Giving Tuesday is now in its fourth year and continuing to grow! In addition to celebrating philanthropy, Giving Tuesday also strives to connect diverse groups of individuals, communities and organizations around the world for one common purpose.
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            This year, we are asking you to help us grow the movement by donating to the Eric D. Dettenreider Memorial Fund on Giving Tuesday! We love being able to provide clinics and events for our athletes but these events do cost money to run and, as a non-profit, we rely solely on donations to help us fund our events. The majority of our support comes from individuals like you. Thanks to all these generous donations, each of our athletes is able to participate in our various sports clinics free of charge. By having the opportunity to play soccer, basketball, swimming, and skiing with their buddies, our athletes and buddies are creating countless memories and close relationships that carry on over the years. The excitement and joy we see in our athletes during our clinics is a priceless experience that we hope to continue to provide for years to come. This holiday season, in the spirit of giving, please consider donating to the EDD Memorial Fund!

Our Auction Committee is hard at work cataloging the beautiful items for next weekend's silent auction. A generous group of artists, craftspeople and friends have donated unique pieces to the EDD All-Star Benefit silent auction. There's something for every interest, including original artwork, themed gift baskets, books, gift certificates to local hot-spots and a pair of telemark skis.  

Join us for the EDD Memorial Fund All-Star Benefit Dinner & Silent Auction!
Saturday, October 29
5:30pm  Silent Auction & Cash Bar
​6:30 pm Dinner & Program
Elk's Club, 84 Chestnut Street, Oneonta, NY

Featuring
Presentation of 2016 EDD All-Star Team *Balloon Art for the kids *Music by the Sweet Adelines Quartet "Euphoria"

​On Sunday August 20th, EDD athletes and Saint Michael’s Women’s and Men’s Soccer players all came together for an adaptive soccer clinic on George “Doc” Jacobs Field.  The goals of the clinic were for the EDD athletes to improve their soccer skills and to make connections with the college athletes who were paired up with them. The clinic was full with excitement. We divided the 22 participants into groups by age, and each athlete went to four different stations which included shooting, passing, dribbling and scrimmaging against some of the SMC players on the big field.  All the athletes enjoyed the full field scrimmage because it gave them an opportunity to show off their skills!
 
 The excitement from all the athletes was something we’ve never seen before. The St. Michael’s players enjoyed getting to know the EDD athletes.  The experience also gave our teams the chance to reflect on how truly lucky we are for what we do as athletes every day.  For some players, simply making contact with the soccer ball made their day, and we celebrated each accomplishment, large or small.  Following the soccer session, the athletes were given an SMC soccer shirt, a certificate, and medal for participation. The SMC athletes then made a tunnel for the EDD athletes to run through and cheer them on for what a wonderful job they did during the clinic.  We are excited to be holding another EDD adaptive clinic on Sunday October 23rd from 11 - 1pm at Saint Michaels College.

          One of our goals as interns for the EDD Memorial Fund and members of the Saint Michael’s College women’s soccer team is to connect the Saint Michael’s College community and the EDD athletes in as many ways as possible. We want our classmates and peers to see the impact they can make in the lives of the EDD athletes. In order to make this connection, we have been brainstorming different events we could hold on campus and various ways we could include the EDD athletes in our own athletic endeavors. After watching a professional soccer game on TV, we had an epiphany. Wouldn’t it be great to have the EDD athletes walk out with our starters, the same way professional soccer players walk out with young soccer players?

           We sent out a message to all local EDD athletes inviting them to join the Saint Michael’s College women’s soccer team on Duffy Field for a home game on September 17th, 2016. Five of our EDD athletes joined the starting players as they walked out to the center of the field and greeted the crowd before standing with the women’s team as the national anthem played. The EDD athletes were cheering “Go Saint Mike’s!” for the duration of the walkout and our players were ecstatic to be with our EDD buddies again. The EDD player’s excitement for us and their continuous, energetic chants helped calm our nerves and prepare us to play our match. Our EDD athletes then joined the women’s team in their pregame huddle to hear the pump up speech and cheer along with the team as the starters ran out onto the field to take on their opponent.  It was incredible to be able to share the exciting experience of walking out with our EDD athletes and allow them to truly be a part of our team. We had many peers come up to us after the game telling us how great they thought this event was and we were thrilled to hear that the crowd enjoyed it just as much as we did.

         This was the first time we have had athletes walk out with our soccer team and are hoping to get even more EDD athletes to come out to our next walk out with the men’s soccer team on October 1st! Ideally, we would like to get all the sports teams on campus involved so the EDD athletes have the opportunity to meet all the Saint Michael’s College athletes and be a part of different sporting events. 

​Say hello to our interns for the fall semester, Nicole DeOrsey and Andie Devaney. These two Saint Michael's College students will be helping the EDD Memorial Fund expand and update all of our social media outlets as well as organizing various events for our EDD athletes! Read below to find out more about our girls!



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Hello! My name is Nicole DeOrsey I am junior at St. Michael’s College, I am a Psychology major and Sociology minor. I am a member of the St. Mike’s Women’s Soccer Team.  Growing up in Vermont I have had the opportunity to work in not only adaptive sports through TOP Soccer but also through schools in my hometown. I am very excited to be interning of the EDD Memorial Fund and looking forward to spread my love for the game of soccer to athletes in the EDD program.

Hi! My name is Andie Devaney and I am interning for the EDD program for the fall semester. I am a junior here at Saint Michaels and am majoring in English and minoring in Political Science. I am also a member of the women’s soccer team. I have been involved in adaptive sports for the past 6 years, working with the TOPS soccer program in my town, and am excited to be able to continue working with and sharing my love for soccer with the athletes involved in the EDD program here in Vermont. ​

Last week, the Oneonta Outlaws baseball team hosted an adaptive baseball clinic for Oneonta-area youth.  Seventeen children and young adults paired up with members of the Oneonta Outlaws to practice skills and play ball on Damaschke Field in Oneonta, NY.  “It’s a great day for playing baseball,” said General Manager Joe Hughes as he introduced the members of the Outlaws.  Under a beautiful July sky, athletes lined up to practice throwing and catching with a buddy.  After half an hour of skill work, they moved on to the scrimmage match.
 
Everyone was excited to get up to bat, perhaps nobody more-so than Andrew.  He arrived for the clinic in his Boston Redsox uniform; he had been looking forward to this program for months. Andrew gladly stepped up to the plate during the scrimmage and showed off his swing.  Rhonda shocked all of the Outlaws players with her batting skills.  She didn't swing hard at the first pitches, but behind her big smile, she was concentrating.  After two strikes, she bunted and ran to first.  Her team mates hit her home.
 
Throughout the clinic, EDD athletes and the Outlaws players shared stories and joked with each other.  EDD athlete Chris loves to challenge the volunteers, and he asked two of the Outlaws players to race him around the bases.  They accepted the challenge, and Chris led the pack all the way around the field.  These social interactions are part of what makes this program unique. 

Thank you to Joe Hughes, Atlee Pearson and the Oneonta Outlaws for leading a great program! 

UPDATE: Program Cancelled for 7/14

This summer, Burlington-area youth can get into the garden and get dirty as they learn about growing healthy food. 

St. Michael's College student Abby Pelon is starting a therapeutic gardening program at Starr Farm Garden in Burlington. Abby is an EDD soccer clinic volunteer and is excited to share her love of gardening.  The first session will be on July 14 at 6pm. 

For Immediate Release: April 28, 2016
For More Information, Contact: Josh Kessler, (802) 654-2537


COLCHESTER, Vt. - The Saint Michael's College men's and women's soccer teams hosted a free clinic on Sunday for children and young adults with physical, cognitive or developmental disabilities through the Eric D. Dettenrieder (EDD) Memorial Fund. This marks the sixth consecutive year the women's program has paired with the EDD Memorial Fund for such an event, having also hosted a clinic in August at the Doc Jacobs Field Complex.
 
The Purple and Gold taught skills in a non-competitive setting for 24 athletes, with a scrimmage, pizza and an awards ceremony following. Not only has the women's soccer team hosted a clinic through the EDD Memorial Fund each of the past six falls, but the student-athletes have annually gone bowling with many of the children and young adults who attend the clinics. This was the Purple Knights' third spring clinic in four years, and the women's soccer squad is also slated to host its annual fall clinic through the EDD Memorial Fund on Aug. 20.
 
Through programming such as this weekend's event, the EDD Memorial Fund will reach 300 kids and young adults with disabilities this year. For more information, contact EDD Memorial Fund Director Gretchen Owens at (802) 399-4366 or events@eddfund.org, or visit eddfund.org and facebook.com/eddfund.
 
The EDD Memorial Fund, which is named for the late Dettenrieder, who worked as a ski instructor for terminally ill children, serves to build self-confidence and purpose in young people with disabilities through providing sports opportunities. The fund provides recreational and competitive sports programs for individuals with disabilities in New York, Pennsylvania and Vermont.
 

Vermont families can take advantage of this new adaptive program, hosted by Kayla's Directory and The Edge Sports and Fitness.  The "Ready, Set, Run Mini-Milers Club" starts on April 16th.  Its a 6 week program for kids in K - 6th grade that provides a way to learn about and practice fitness, good nutrition and goal-setting.  

For more information, please use the link below. 

http://www.kaylasdirectory.org/event/ready-set-run-mini-milers-adaptive-program/

This program is not affiliated with the EDD Memorial Fund.  

 Thanks to our generous donors, the EDD Memorial Fund met - and exceeded - our fundraising goals for 2015!   Your charitable contributions supported sixteen adaptive sports programs in all four seasons.  Nearly three hundred young people with disabilities played baseball, soccer, rode horseback, and skied with us, to name just a few. 

Our heartfelt thanks to everyone who chose to support the EDD Memorial Fund in 2015.