Business & Tech

At Kempo, It's Fun for a Good Cause

Academy of Kempo Martial Arts held its first Costume Extravaganza to benefit the "Help a Child Initiative, collecting arts and craft supplies, books, toys and other needed materials for the children who are undergoing cancer treatments.

 

Academy of Kempo Martial Arts held its first Costume Extravaganza to benefit the “Help a Child Initiative” on Saturday, Oct. 27. This was a fundraiser to collect arts and craft supplies, books, toys and other needed materials for the children who are undergoing cancer treatments.

“It was a very fun event for my students and for me. The Extravaganza was a way to have the students help others while having fun and learning,” Shihan Frank Ciarleglio said. “The students learned a little about what the cancer patients are going through and how their donation makes a difference for these children.”

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The students also participated in a Costume Parade and a safety class that covered costume safety and Halloween safety.

“The students discovered if their costumes restrict movement or vision, and how to fix those restrictions so that accidents can be prevented”, said Ciarleglio.

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The Academy had the children doing their Martial Arts movements in their costumes and played fun Martial Arts related games, with prizes for everyone. Shihan Ciarleglio also took pictures of the students and posted them on the Academy’s Facebook page as a contest to see which costume receives the most votes.

“Our students love the opportunity to enter in the contest and of course have a chance of winning the prize, they also get very excited that people vote for them, so please feel free to place your vote”, said Ciarleglio.

The Academy supplied prizes and goody bags for all participants along with Jen’s Avon in Hamden, who was a sponsor and donated extra goodies as well as hand sanitizers for each goody bag.

The “Help a Child Initiative” is a program started by Shihan Ciarleglio in 2009 to help children with life threatening diseases. The program is designed to collect items such as arts and crafts material for children as young as infant to 21 years of age. These items include Tempera Paints, sand art kits, bead kits, window painting kits, wood projects and jewelry kits.

The “Help a Child Initiative” is also collecting items that can be decorated, such as white tee shirts, white pillowcases,I-pod cases and cloth bags and general items needed to assist The Tommy Fund for Childhood Cancer and the Child Life Specialist-Pediatric Specialty Clinic at the Yale-New Haven Children’s Hospital.

“This is still one of our major goals with the program, but because of the great response that we have had, the program has grown into much more. We are also collecting toys, books, games and pretty much anything that a child can play with while they are undergoing treatments," he said.

The program also collects revenues so that the Tommy Fund will continue to have a budget built in to purchase what it needs so the Child Life Specialist can work with the children who are undergoing cancer treatments. Prior to 2010, there really was not a budget for arts and crafts, and all of the arts and crafts were donated, but because of the “Help a Child Initiative”, the Tommy Fund was able to have a small budget for these items which have such an important impact with the children.

"There venues also assist the Tommy Fund in continuing their research to find a cure for cancer and assist families that have children who are in a treatment program” said Ciarleglio.

Donations are still being collected at the Academy of Kempo Martial Arts, located at 1890 Dixwell Ave., Hamden, CT 06514. A list of items can be found at www.academyofkempo.com or you can call Shihan Frank Ciarleglio at 203-288-9990 to find out how you can help and when is a good time to drop off your donations.

Monetary contributions are welcome in check form made out to the Tommy Fund or by visiting the Tommy Fund web site at www.tommyfund.org. Please note on your check or on-line donation “Help a Child Initiative” so the Tommy Fund will know how to allocate your contribution.


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