Batavia students and staff take the 'polar plunge' for a good cause

City of Batavia firefighters are on hand Friday for the dozens of soaking wet people standing outside in the frigid weather at John Kennedy Intermediate School, but it wasn’t due to any unfortunate emergency, school counselor and event Co-Chairman Eric Knapp says.

Quite the contrary, those brave souls were part of what’s become a traditional gathering of Batavia City School, fire department, business and community representatives for a yearly fundraiser to benefit Special Olympics of Western New York.

This event has been so successful, the Special Olympics organization recognized organizers this year with a plaque.

“We are the number one leading school district and we received what was called the Cool School Award for raising the most money. So they're going to present us with a plaque for this year. I'm not sure if we're going to be number one for this year. But last year, we were number one. I think we're going to be a strong number two, which is still pretty good,” Knapp said during the event surrounded by some 150 participants, organizers and supporters. “I’m a school counselor for John Kennedy School, and it's just to get the whole idea of helping people in your community. And it’s also bringing attention to the Special Olympics and the athletes and all the gifts that they have. So bringing awareness to diverse people … it's just the coolest thing to help other people, especially the Special Olympics population.”

The coolest thing? He can say that again: “it’s literally going to be the coolest thing, when it’s like 10-degrees,” he said. “We are all together, some will get wet, some will not get wet, it’s pretty cold.”

Organizations included the fire department and its union, the school’s Varsity football team, Batavia Middle School Honor Society, JK’s fourth grade mentors, New York State Troopers, Batavia Police Department, the district’s students and staff and Jersey Mike’s.

Eric’s wife Krista, a second grade teacher, first began doing a polar plunge at Lake Ontario for Special Olympics before the pandemic hit, and then she and her husband brought the idea of a polar spray to Batavia to continue with the fundraising, he said.

Successful? You bet. They raised $10,000 last year and surpassed that with a total of $10,060 this year. Polar Plunge is the organization’s largest fundraiser for New York State, Senior Director for Development Kelley Ligozio said. When the pandemic and shutdowns happened, the Knapp couple and fellow organizers “wanted to build some spirit amongst our administrators and our students because COVID was really hard on everybody,” she said. 

 “And it's resulted in now 150 people here today to raise money to support people with intellectual differences, from our young athletes to our unified program in the schools, to our traditional competition,” Ligozio said. “The money that we're raising today, and what we raise across the state, goes back into the communities that we serve, and we serve over 3,500 athletes across the greater Rochester area. It is amazing."

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Photos by Steve Ognibene