Let's Go Team!!!

Every year, Vanderbilt Hospital's Orthopedic Group sponsors a local high school football rivalry game as part of their SHINE charity***. The event includes a football game, guest speaker and a silent auction. The proceeds from all of this are given to the Susan Gray School (where Greyson and Quinn attend). This year Vanderbilt has sponsored the 50th anniversary of the Franklin HS Battle Ground Academy (BGA) grudge match. As part of the event football players from each school spend time at Susan Gray to learn the impact of what they are involved in.

While everyone was excited to have the football players come, there was one little boy who was more excited than anyone. Greyson was on cloud nine being able to cheer on his own BGA team (although technically his room was assigned to Franklin it didn't matter to Greyson). After the 'pep rally' he went over the the BGA players, gave them high fives and let them know he was going to BGA next year. They were so nice and took pictures with him and even gave him a ride on their shoulders. He is now more excited than ever to go to BGA and kept telling me he can't wait to see his new friends at school. (I didn't have the heart to tell him that I didn't think the football players would be in Kindergarten next year). LET'S GO BGA WILDCATS!!!


***For those of you who are confused about why a hospital would be fund raising for a preschool, Susan Gray is no ordinary preschool. Founded in part by (duh) Susan Gray, one of the pioneers of early childhood education who also helped found the National HeadStart Program, The Susan Gray School was one of the first preschools in that nation to promote inclusiveness. Susan Gray believed that all children, both special needs and typically developing, would benefit from being in a shared environment. As part of Vanderbilt's Peabody School of Education and Vanderbilt's Kennedy Center (one of the nation's premier therapy and research centers for children with disabilities) Susan Gray is used as a 'laboratory' for cutting edge research in the area of early childhood development. PhD and Masters students regularly utilize the school and its students for research projects and subject matter for their theses. It is a school unlike any other devoted to promoting education and acceptance for all types of children.