Dean’s Reflections

Oh, What a Year!

by Dean Crowe | Dec 20, 2022

Oh, what a year! As you know, we take every dollar given to Rally seriously. It could be the dollar that finds the cure for children fighting cancer. And sometimes kids, like Keren, must fight more than one cancer. Your donations matter. Every dollar matters. Please give today #ForTheirFuture. Thank you for entrusting Rally with your generous gift. Without you, none of what I am about to share would be possible. For the second year in a row, Rally has received a PERFECT SCORE OF 100% FROM CHARITY NAVIGATOR. This makes Rally the highest rated childhood cancer charity funding research nationally and internationally and providing family support. This year through Rally’s dual peer review grant process, we granted $3.4 million to fellows, young investigators, independent investigators and consortiums bringing our total to $25.4 million and 457 research projects across the U.S. and...

Dean’s Reflections – August 2021

by Dean Crowe | Aug 29, 2021

Hi Friends, Can you believe the kids are already back in school? Summer flew by! It is great to see some normalcy returning. I mean, who wants to miss another season of college football? I’ll be honest: this summer was a rough patch with our Rally Kids. Too many relapses and too many kids earning their angel wings. But, there was great news too! Rally Kids finishing treatment and ringing the bell, some moving onto survivorship clinic and plenty of Rally Kids graduating from high school and headed to college. Even wedding bells rang—so sweet. The end of summer means Childhood Cancer Awareness Month is almost here! Fasten your seat belts. Below is a link to a blog that is All Things September. #GOLDSTRONG™ is quickly becoming the universal battle cry of the childhood cancer community. Please feel free to use #GOLDSTRONG in September and all year long. DRUM ROLL, PLEASE! As you know,...

Dean’s Reflections – June 2021

by Dean Crowe | Aug 29, 2021

Hi Friends, The Rally Team came to me with an idea. And you know at Rally, if there is one thing we like, it is new ideas! They wanted to do a quarterly newsletter that would be concise and let Rally, our community as a whole, know what was happening. They asked me if they could call it Dean’s Reflections. I personally think Rally Reflections would have been better, but I finally agreed. So welcome to the first Dean’s Reflections. My first reflection is looking back on 2020 and at the first half of 2021. I honestly have to tell you that I am so proud and humbled by Rally and our amazing community. In the middle of a pandemic, your generous support allowed us to support 352 families in 30 states through the hardships of fighting childhood cancer and an international pandemic. Throughout the pandemic, you supported our Department of Defense Medical Research advocacy efforts resulting in...

Dear Presh

by Dean Crowe | Jun 30, 2021

Dear Presh (a.k.a. Sarah), My heart gets a little heavy this time of year. I start to wonder why and then realize that it means another year has passed since I last saw you. Last held your hand. Last hugged you. You fought Ewing’s Sarcoma with such poise, grace and unwavering faith in the Lord that I could only stand in awe. I didn’t meet you and your family until after your first battle with Ewing’s. I actually remember exactly where we met and how we immediately hit it off. I remember we laughed and laughed. From there our friendship just grew. You visited the Rally office, filmed videos and spoke at Rally events. There were Subway and Chick-fil-A lunches. There were also relapses, hospital visits and doctor’s appointments that you invited me to. There are so many Presh memories. Indulge me as I recall a few. You found it so funny that any medical procedure, while it fascinated you,...

Dear William

by Dean Crowe | May 22, 2021

Dear William, There are so many memories. So many. You were the inspiration for Rally. The first Rally Kid. Your driveway was the prayer circle driveway. The driveway where, every Monday, Wednesday and Friday morning at 9:30, God took a minimum of six to as many as 15 women on an unbelievable journey to pray you and your family through your first relapse with medulloblastoma—a pediatric brain tumor. We were an interesting crew made up mainly of baseball moms from all different faiths, denominations, neighborhoods and schools. We had ladies who “named it and claimed it” and ladies who said, “This is God’s will” and ladies who said, “We just don’t get it, Lord” and ladies who never said a word but faithfully showed up. Where Rally Started From your driveway to your hospital room, Rally Foundation for Childhood Cancer Research was birthed. Rally was never about one kid, one type of...

Building a Bridge: Expediating and Advancing Pediatric Brain Tumor Research

by Dean Crowe | May 10, 2021

When to Build a New Bridge I love Rally. I love all the unique opportunities it provides—like building a bridge. Who knew? But first, a little background. A few weeks ago, my husband Reid and his good friend Marty built a bridge across the creek in our backyard. The landscape and topography around the creek changed through the years, and our low-profile bridge had washed away. So, to get to the other side of the creek, Reid would put on his waders and trudge across the water. It wasn’t very efficient, but it worked. The new bridge is higher, sturdier and stronger. It makes crossing to the other side much easier. And now that we can get to the other side of the creek, guess what? There is more work to be done in that part of the yard. Today at Rally, we have a unique opportunity to build a bridge together, so some very important work can be done on the other side. How cool is that?...

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Oh, What a Year!

Dean’s Reflections – August 2021

Dean’s Reflections – June 2021

Dear Presh

Dear William

Building a Bridge: Expediating and Advancing Pediatric Brain Tumor Research

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