WEST POINT, Ga. — Some Auburn University students are partnering with West Point, Ga., resident Mary Anne Cash and other local volunteers for an upcoming “Gateway to a Cure” fundraiser for the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation.
It’s a win-win situation for the students and the cause of finding a cure for juvenile diabetes, a debilitating illness that requires long-term treatment. The students have received classroom credit for an interior design course they’ve taken, and fundraising for the JDRF helps finding a cure for the illness.
“The Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation is the leading charitable funder and advocate of Type I, or juvenile, diabetes worldwide,” Cash said. “The foundation believes that a cure is in our near future. They will continue to work for an improved lifestyle as well.”
The students have offered a helping hand to an upcoming fundraiser through a Visual Presentation 1 class. They are sophomores in the university’s interior design program and take the class during the fall semester of their second year.
As part of their coursework this past fall, they took a field trip to West Point, where they toured the Davidson estate. They were given the task of creating three different pieces of furniture, fixture or detail. The design students made field measurements, took photos and did quick sketches of items they saw inside and on the grounds of the old home and used the data to create the kind of detailed construction drawings a contractor needs to make furniture items.
The students were also asked to design a room around each of their creations, demonstrated through perspective drawings detailing the scale of each design and indicating their intended use.
“We are so pleased that the interior design program is dedicated to working with the JDRF to see this project to fruition,” Cash said. “The students will also be making posters and other advertising materials promoting our upcoming gala event, which will be taking place in the fall of 2012.
“It is very refreshing to see this diverse group of students happy, willing and eager to work for a cure for this unpredictable, devastating disease. It’s absolutely heart warming to see them ‘giving back’ to this great cause.”
Cash is spearheading the upcoming fundraiser along with interior design professor Paula Francis Peek, Lyndsay Fukal, Susan Pitts, Lynn Johnson and Lisa Mundy.
