Principal Casey Taylor kisses Silhouette the pig as the result of a sports fundraiser. (Elizabeth De Alwis/The Post)
Achieve Charter School Principal Casey Taylor planted her lips on a real live pig yesterday morning, cheered on by the student body despite threats of extra homework.
It was the result of a fundraising effort in which students filled more than 20 piggy banks with donations for the school’s new sports programs. Each piggy bank represented a teacher or staff member, and the pig with most money in it was the one chosen to kiss a real pig from a student’s farm during yesterday’s awards assembly. In all, the pigs held $250, and nearly half of it was in Taylor’s piggy bank. The multi-purpose room was packed with parents and students as “Silhouette” walked in for her kiss.

“I brought my special kissing lips,” Taylor said, evoking laughter from her students. “It’s no secret that I love animals,” she said sarcastically. Cameras flashed and cheers erupted as Taylor, wearing plastic red lips, leaned in to kiss the pig.

“It was wonderful,” she joked afterwards, ” a privilege.”

Though it is a well-known fact at Achieve Carter School that its principal was not an animal lover, kissing the pig was “a clear sign I love my school,” Taylor said.

The school has raised $1,100 already for the new sports and physical education programs, and now has raised another $250 from the piggy banks, Taylor said. The money will fund grades K-7 cross country, 4-7 volleyball, and 5-7 basketball.

The school recently purchased new PE equipment to meet the needs of the middle school students, but the elementary school children have been benefiting from it as well. The school also bought new uniforms for the basketball teams. Achieve has recently started competing in sporting events with other schools. On Thursday, the boys basketball team played its first game against Yuba Feather, but lost by one point, 26-25. After the pig-kissing, the students in grades K-3 received awards for academic conduct, improvement and effort, and the 4-7 grade students were announced for honor roll.

Kieron Seaman, front, and Harry Bullas, had a busy day keeping goal during the penalty competition at Westwoodside Playing Field Open Day

The annual Westwoodside Playing Fields open day was well attended by local people, with rides and a bouncy castle new to this year’s event.

Organisers had set themselves a fundraising target of £1,000 as a contribution to a project for an all-weather sports pitch for the villages.

Playing Fields’ Association chairman Richard Carter said the signs were good at the successful event.

He said: “We don’t do many fundraising events, so we rely on this for as much money as possible.

“It’s definitely going well.”

The association has applied to Wren for funding, but were told to raise more cash themselves first – which members are now well on the way to doing, Mr Carter said.

Grants have been awarded by North Lincolnshire Council and Haxey Parish Council to support the scheme.

People taking part in events at the fair were having a good time on Sunday afternoon.

Westwoodside Football Club were demonstrating penalty kicks. Keeper Harry Bullas, 14, of West Butterwick, said: “We started out two seasons ago.

“We got promoted in our first year and finished fifth last season.

“This is a good event.”

Stallholder Beverley Lamb, 51, was selling home-made jewellery at the Westwoodside open day.

She said: “It’s a good family day out.”

For the full story, buy today’s Scunthorpe Telegraph.

By John MANNING

Wednesday August 26 2009

IT was a case of one sport helping another when golfers took to the tee in support of a fundraising effort for Skerries Harps GAA Club.

The local golf club was the venue and some 16 teams lined up to drive down the fairways in support of Skerries Harps.

All the funds raised by the event are to be ploughed back into the club and will mostly go towards funding the thriving juvenile section in Skerries Harps.

Victorious on the day were the team led by John O’Regan of Softex, he and team members, Brendan Barden, Billy Martin and Frank McKenna managed to accumulate an impressive 89 points on the day and took home the first prize. Second was the team led by Nicky Heaney of AIB, made up of Graciano Roneri, Keith Cairns and John Cotter who finished just a single point behind the winning team on 88 points.

Pat Hurley led the third team home just another point behind in a day that proved hugely successful for the club.

The money is still being counted but the GAA club is very happy with the turnout and how well the event was supported by sponsors.

Special thanks goes to C & T Supermarkets who were the main sponsors and to O’Driscoll O’Neill who were the tees and greens sponsors. Thanks also goes from the club to everyone who donated prizes to the raffle and everyone who supported the event and helped to make it a success.

In football, Skerries Harps field five juvenile teams in the boy’s section and three in the girl’s in a thriving youth section in the club.

Hurling is well catered for in the juvenile section too with four underage teams as well as three underage camogie teams.

Adults play football in the club at junior, minor, senior and under-21 level in the men’s section and the ladies field two adult team in football and no less than three adult camogie teams.

- John MANNING

10 Secrets to Golf Tournament Fundraising: https://secure.fasttrackfundraising.com/ebook-order.php?type=golf

Fundraise At Your Sports Games and Events
Have you ever thought about selling products in the stands during games, tournaments, and other events? The reason this works is because since there is high foot traffic at these events you have a great opportunity to get people to support the team. Another benefit is you can raise more in less time. A lot of groups use this strategy every year and change out the product each year to have a variety. Supporters look what is being sold at each game and event. For example: sell customized sport bracelets in your team colors at your games, tournaments and all season long.(http://www.fasttrackfundraising.com/silicone-awareness-bracelet-fundraiser.php) This sports fundraising idea shouldn’t be overlooked, as it could make or break your sports fundraising goal.

ROCHESTER — A fundraising event to benefit the Spaulding High School boys tennis team will be held at Gary’s Restaurant and Sports Lounge on Route 125 on Aug. 8 from 7 p.m. until midnight.

Entertainment will be provided by Rone Jones, Code 3, Discount Gigolos and Mainly Hawaiian, with a $5 cover charge going to the team. A raffle will feature man prizes, including Bruins tickets and an Omega Z5 .50 caliber muzzleloader rifle.

To purchase raffle tickets, contact Susan Pelletier at 330-3256 or e-mail questions to svptennis@metrocast.net.

Bowden (left) is preparing for his 34th season at FSU and it figures that either this season or the next will be his last. At least, that’s the thought given the university’s coach-in-waiting arrangement with Seminoles’ offensive coordinator Jimbo Fisher, whom FSU will owe $5 million if he’s not the head coach by January 2011.

Despite the contract — and the logic that comes with it — Bowden has refused to define his exit.

“Because it’s just going to mean,” he said, “[that] every time you play a ballgame, somebody is going to say, ‘Well, this is the last time he’s going to play in this stadium. This is the last time he’s going to play in that stadium. And so I won’t say.

“People are going to put together what they want to, but I won’t say.”

Even so, Bowden’s activities during the past week might have represented the beginnings of the exact kind of farewell tour he so desperately wants to avoid. He began last week with a trip to Florence, Ala., where he joined sons Tommy, Terry and Jeff for a “Day with the Bowdens” fundraising event at North Alabama. There, Terry is attempting to rekindle his coaching career.

Then, on Wednesday, Bowden returned to Tallahassee to be roasted at a $125-per-ticket event put on by the Tallahassee Quarterback Club. The guest list was impressive: Tom Osborne, the former Nebraska coach, and Burt Reynolds; Heisman Trophy quarterback Chris Weinke and FSU legend Ron Simmons; Georgia Coach Mark Richt, among others.

And the implication was clear: They’d all gathered not so much to share a laugh at Bowden’s expense — as is supposed to be the goal of a roast — but instead to pay tribute to a man who in all likelihood will retire at some point during the next 18 months.

Both events — North Alabama’s Bowden Day and the roast — were supposed to be more celebratory than serious. Yet hanging over Bowden at both were reminders of the possibility that he might lose 14 games from his career record because of a cheating scandal in which he played no role.

During a news conference with all four Bowden men at North Alabama, the first question was for the eldest Bowden and, not surprisingly, it focused on Florida State’s ongoing NCAA appeal, which is attempting to preserve Bowden’s victories and those from nine other sports during the 2006 and ’07 seasons.

Later, Bowden, 79, spent another half-hour answering questions, most about his record and his ongoing competition with Penn State’s Joe Paterno, who holds a one-victory lead (383-382) over Bowden in the race to retire the most victorious coach in major-college football history.

The academic fraud scandal was less a focus at the roast, but the contrast of that event to current events was clear: All the luminaries — from Reynolds, the movie star, to Richt, the former FSU offensive coordinator — had gathered to celebrate Bowden amid one of the most difficult times of his career.

Lou Holtz, Bowden’s longtime friend, taped a video tribute for the roast and he threw a “Free Shoes University” joke in there about FSU’s Foot Locker scandal from the 1990s. Others picked on Bowden’s age, or his tendency to substitute someone’s first name with “buddy.”

Yet no one found any humor in the academic fraud scandal, and no one joked about it. Weinke, who helped lead the ‘Noles to the 1999 national championship, was the only one who even alluded to it when he said, “It doesn’t matter what the NCAA says. To me, Coach Bowden will always be the winningest coach in college football.”

People clapped for that, and they later stood and cheered — more than 600 of them in a packed banquet hall — for Bowden. He said during his appearance at North Alabama that his retirement wouldn’t be hastened if the NCAA’s decision to vacate victories is eventually upheld.

And the week before that, sitting behind his desk in his office, Bowden said what he liked most about his Seminoles now is that he thinks they have a chance to resemble some of his teams of old.

“If they all stay healthy, this could be a pretty doggone good ballclub,” Bowden said. “Then, the next year, you’ve got ‘em all back.”

That “next year,” as Bowden put it, in 2010, FSU would figure to have a senior quarterback in Christian Ponder, a veteran offensive line that could return every starter for the second consecutive season and a defense that could have the potential to be the Seminoles’ nastiest in years.

Bowden wouldn’t say it, of course, but it seems he might have reason to stick around until then, to make one last run at a championship and to try and put a perfect ending on the farewell tour he wants no part of.

Andrew Carter’s Chopping Block blog can be read at OrlandoSentinel.com/choppingblock and he can be reached at acarterb@orlandosentinel.com.

Copyright © 2009, Orlando Sentinel

By Andrew Carter Sentinel Staff Writer
10:48 PM EDT, July 18, 2009

The state-of-the-art facility will provide varied opportunities for study, sports and play. The 6-to-10 p.m. fundraiser will feature musical entertainment from 2009 American Idol contestant and Brentwood resident Ashley Mendez, a putting contest and food from Brentwood Fine Meats.”

http://www.mercurynews.com/breakingnews/ci_12704346