John Jay High School student raises $7,361 this summer for special needs kids

Last week, New York State Senator Pete Harckham held a virtual awards ceremony on Zoom recognizing Morgan Burhance, a rising senior, for creating a fundraiser that generated $7,361 in donations to help special needs kids served by Healing Hearts Adaptive Recreation, a 501(c)3 non-profit. 

Morgan, who’s on the John Jay varsity field hockey team, had planned to work with the participants at Healing Hearts this past spring and summer to bring to them a fun group activity during their weekly Friday night gatherings.  Her plan was to create a modified, safe floor hockey program using soft sticks and a softball.  When COVID-19 hit in March, it not only disrupted her plan for modified floor hockey, it also canceled the annual fundraiser for Healing Hearts which this non-profit counts on for their operations.

Morgan wanted to help, so she decided to create a field hockey fundraiser right in her own driveway. She built a heart-shaped goal and set the intention of making 1,000 goals from a distance of 16 yards to make the community aware of Healing Hearts and how they serve kids of differing abilities.

Over this spring and summer, Morgan shot goals and posted on a Facebook page she created about her service project and regularly featured on the page Healing Hearts participants who she paid tribute to on specific days by making goals in their honor. The funds she raised came from 100 donors. During the presentation today Morgan said, “I wanted to do it for these kids because they should have the same opportunities that everyone else has.”

Senator Harckham said, “For you to make such an impact on such as group the way you did and to take it upon yourself to do this is remarkable. That’s great leadership and it’s great compassion that you would choose kids who learn and play differently to be the beneficiaries of your hard work.”

Tom Bacha, one of the co-founders of Healing Hearts whose daughter is a participant, said about Morgan’s fundraiser, “That’s the big difference with these kids.  Often times they stay quiet, they stay in the shadows because they feel like they don’t fit in… When you bring it out and have such an impact on these kids, it helps more than we probably understand at this point. Can’t say how much we appreciate your thinking and your actions.”

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Submitted by Lewisboro, NY

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