Austin's Grisham Middle School helping Season for Caring recipient, mom with breast cancer
Kristin Ramirez describes her children’s personalities and ambitions thoughtfully and with affection. Fenix, 4, the youngest — who immediately hugged an American-Statesman journalist with a wide smile — is a “wild child.”
Gigi, 16, and Matthew, 6, are the most artistic.
Gabriel, 7, is eager to start a YouTube channel featuring his family. Isaiah, 9, is the “protector” and the “man of the house.” Michael, 10, loves “Dragon Ball Z” and wants to write his own manga.
Ramirez has stage 3 breast cancer and is going through treatment. Her family is one of the 12 chosen to be highlighted in this year's Statesman Season for Caring. Each year donations help the featured families as well as hundreds like them through local nonprofit organizations. Ramirez was nominated by the Breast Cancer Resource Center.
This year, the Ramirez family will get some help from a group of Austin children. Grisham Middle School in the Round Rock district has chosen this family as the Season for Caring beneficiary it wants to support this year.
"I'm so excited for my kids," Ramirez said when she found out. "We have been through so much. They don't know what it's like to enjoy themselves as kids."
Grisham art teacher Kristin Goodman and theater teacher Kati Garrett head the project, though really the students lead it. They create a business plan, make posters and flyers, canvass the neighborhood and ask at their parents' businesses for donations. They even wrap all the presents. It becomes a schoolwide initiative.
This will be the 12th year the students have rallied around Season for Caring. Last year they raised more than $20,000 in gifts and gift cards. They have given more than $75,000 since they first helped a Season for Caring family in 2010.
That first family the Grisham students helped in 2010 was similar to the Ramirez family: a single mom with cancer, Nancy Knox. That year, Goodman asked her students to give items on Knox's wish lists instead of giving the teacher a Christmas gift. It ended up being Knox's last Christmas.
"We do it in her honor," Goodman said a few years ago. "It's the spirit of the thing. Some kids give up gifts on their wish lists to give to Season for Caring."
Behind the giving: Kristin Ramirez, single Austin mom of six, faces stage 3 breast cancer | Season for Caring
The giving is also a great lesson for the middle schoolers.
"It is all of our responsibilities to take care of each other," Goodman said last year.
"We hope the kids will grow up and pass it on," Garrett said.
The Ramirez family has some needs the Grisham students won't be able to fulfill. They need help with medical bills, legal services for child support, a gently used car, a sofa and a mentor to help Ramirez write a book for children about having a parent with cancer.
To find out more about Ramirez’s family or to give an item on the wish list, contact the Breast Cancer Resource Center at 512-524-2560 or bcrc.org.
To find out how your group or organization can help a Season for Caring family, contact us at community@statesman.com or 512-912-5900.
About Season for Caring
The Statesman will be sharing the stories of all 12 Season for Caring families throughout the holiday season. Find more stories and information at statesman.com/seasonforcaring. You can donate online or find the coupon on Page 2B. Now through Dec. 25, all monetary donations will be matched up to $500,000 by the Sheth family.
This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Season for Caring mom getting help from Austin's Grisham Middle School
