Frederick Douglass High School senior and Markey DineAround organizer Drew Rodriguez. Photo by Autumn Brea
A day in the life of a high school student typically includes waffles, algebra, maybe a sports practice and an after-school nap. But Drew Rodriguez, a senior at Frederick Douglass High School, can add presenting to the CEO of one of the top cancer foundations in the country and devising a marketing campaign for a city-wide fundraising event to that list. Rodriguez is organizing a first-year event designed to help combat cancer in the community, and he’s enlisting the entire city of Lexington to help him do it.
“Very fortunately, I actually don’t have any immediate family that has been affected by cancer, so I guess that makes me a bit of an outlier – I have learned through this that cancer affects everybody,” Rodriguez said. “Kentucky has the highest cancer incidence in the nation and the highest cancer mortality rate in the nation… We’ve all got a part to play.”
To that end, Rodriguez and his committee have put together an event that makes it easy for the community to participate in the fight against cancer. On Tuesday, Jan. 28, more than 20 area restaurants will donate 25 percent of their total proceeds to the Markey Cancer Foundation, the organization that acts as the fundraising arm for the University of Kentucky Markey Cancer Center, as part of the inaugural Markey DineAround – all that’s asked of the public is they eat at one of the participating restaurants. The event includes breakfast, lunch and dinner sales, with each restaurant operating under its normal business hours.
The idea was sparked by Rodriguez’s involvement with DanceBlue, a popular and successful University of Kentucky fundraising event that students at many local schools participate in. Though he wasn’t initially signed up to take part in the event – he showed up at an organizing meeting on a bit of a whim – he ended up taking on a strong leadership role in FDHS’s DanceBlue chapter during the school’s first year.
“I’ve naturally always gravitated towards leadership, and it was a ship that needed direction,” he explained. During the second year FDHS participated in DanceBlue, Rodriguez took an even stronger leadership role, increasing total donations by 20 percent from year one. While the event was completely different than the DineAround event, it taught him some valuable lessons about organizing and fundraising.
“I’ve learned a lot about setting goals and achieving things…planning something like this [is] like trying to chase animals that are running away,” Rodriguez said. “A big part of fundraising is not just fundraising, it’s explaining your cause, and Dance Blue was the perfect model to understand how to do that.”
After DanceBlue, Rodriguez knew he wanted to do more. During his junior year, at age 16, he reached out to Markey Cancer Foundation president and CEO Michael Delzotti with a fundraising proposal. Delzotti came to Frederick Douglass High School, where the high school student presented a pitch to help the organization.
“I don’t think they were expecting the caliber of presentation that I gave them,” Rodriguez said with a laugh. Indeed, the team from Markey Foundation was impressed and eager to find a way to collaborate with Rodriguez on a fundraising event. Collaboratively, they landed on the DineAround concept. Since the initial proposal, the Markey DineAround team has expanded to include a committee of community leaders, including Chuck Creacy of Smiley Pete Publishing (this magazine’s parent company), Holly Jones Clark of African American Trust for Historic Preservation, Lee Greer of Greer Companies and Kaelyn Query of LexEffects, among others.
“I’ve met so many people doing this, and a lot of them are super enthusiastic and really willing to donate their time,” Rodriguez said. “It’s not me – I’m just putting the pieces together. It’s all these people who have been involved that are making it happen.”
To facilitate the process and further spread awareness, Markey DineAround “ambassadors” will be placed in the restaurants during the event to explain its purpose to diners who might not be aware, and the committee is still looking for members of the community to help fill these roles.
Anyone interested in becoming an ambassador for the event – or otherwise participate in the event – should visit www.markeydinearound.com. The website also features a full list of participating restaurants and other details, which will continue to be updated as the event nears.