Start Your Day With This Nice Feel-Good Story Of Elon Students Raising Money To Send Their Campus Coffee Shop Worker To Disney World
Read full story here - Before starting her shift Monday night, Acorn Coffee Shop employee Kathryn Thompson cried. Her dream had just come true — she would be finally able to take her family to Disney World.
After weeks of fundraising through a GoFundMe page, junior Taylor Zisholtz and freshman Lucy Smith-Williams revealed they had raised more than $6,000 to fly Thompson and four of her family members to “the happiest place on earth.”
Around 9 p.m. Friday, Sept. 11, Zisholtz was sitting in Acorn Coffee Shop, waiting for her sandwich. Since it was a slow evening, Thompson brought Zisholtz her food and immediately started a conversation with the few people in the room.
“I think once we got talking with her, you could see how passionate and even just in the few seconds, you could see how warm she was,” Zisholtz said. “In a world where everybody is so cold, they keep their wishes and their feelings all to themselves. With Kathryn it was just an open door, she welcomes everyone, in and she works so hard.”
Though Thompson didn’t have much to say about Zisholtz’s hometown, a Philadelphia suburb, her eyes lit up when she heard Smith-Williams was from Florida. She fired out questions such as, “How long does it take to drive there?,” and “How much would it cost to take a family of five to Disney World?” She revealed to the girls it was her dream to take her son, daughter-in-law and two grandsons to Disney World. Thompson’s life is rooted at Elon — her parents graduated Elon in the 1950s, she lives across the street from her parents’ house and works five nights a week at Acorn, leaving at 2 a.m. after each shift.
Her dedication and heart inspired Zisholtz and Smith-Williams to do something. Though they were complete strangers at the time, the two quickly became partners-in-crime for the operation. The two researched how much it would cost to send five people to Disney, which came to around $6,000. This goal could be met if half of Elon’s student body donated $2 each. Though neither Zisholtz or Smith-Williams had made a GoFundMe before, they decided it would be the best platform for their cause.
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The page was created Sept. 12. Within three days, half the funds were raised. Their plan was to have the money raised by the end of October so the family could go over Thanksgiving break. But they raised the funds much faster. Zisholtz said everyone — not just the Elon community — shared the GoFundMe on Facebook and donated something, including John Jin from the GoFundMe Team, who donated $1,000. “It was everything we hoped for,” Zisholtz said. “We couldn’t have done it without the community. We have everything ready and we just need to stamp a date.”
Since I’ve started working here 2 years ago (maybe to the day, actually meant to look that up), I’ve discovered the magical place that is Elon University in North Carolina. Now, most of what I know about Elon comes from the Facebook pages of smokeshows which there is no shortage of at Elon, but I constantly see stories like this come out of Elon, and I finally decided to share one of them because this one was too good not to share. Just two students deciding their local coffee shop worker deserved something good in life that otherwise there is no way she could afford. Two strangers with the common goal to raise money from the rest of the Elon community to do something great. We see stories like Mac and Cheese Bro and frats doing ridiculous shit and sometimes wonder what the fuck is going on, and then you see stories like this one and it’s like ok, lots of people are good too. It’s not all Mac and Cheese Bro. So tip of the cap to Elon, who have now raised $6,740 for Kathryn and her family.
And keep the smokeshow nominations coming to the email.