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Rower with autism gets help paying for crew supplies
Jalena, a 15-year-old freshman at Winter Park High School, was one of a dozen novices training on the lake, but she is different in one way: She has autism.
As a nod to her crew ambitions and her academic achievements, the syndicated Tom Joyner radio show announced Wednesday that it will pay her crew dues and other fees for a year if she sticks with the sport. It was one of the “Christmas Wish” grants given to deserving people by the show, which airs on Star 94.5 FM.
Very cool. It’s unfortunate that rowing is so expensive. Around here the high school teams, including Winter Park, receive no monetary help from their respective schools or the county. Equipment is extremely expensive. A boat will cost in excess of $20,000. A set of oars another $2,000 plus. Not to mention the need for waterfront property, coaches, motorboats, trailers, etc.
In my day (20 years ago) our dues were only a couple hundred bucks, but we had a ton of fundraisers. The trend now is to have high dues and hold fundraisers to allow the kids to earn money towards those dues. It allows the teams to have a more steady stream of income, but I suspect they lose a bunch of kids to sticker shock.
On another note, the girl second from the left needs to move her outside hand to end of the damn oar handle.
