This year, Shinerama, Canada’s largest post-secondary fundraiser for cystic fibrosis turns 60 years old. Over 36 colleges and universities across Canada take part in the fundraiser, alongside over 20,000 student volunteers.
Similar fundraisers, Lawn Summer Nights, Ride for the Breath of Life Canada and Walk to Make Cystic Fibrosis History also encourage community organizations to raise for cystic fibrosis annually.
Despite the 60-year anniversary of the fundraiser, there were no special events that took place to mark the achievement.
“We tried to focus our awareness work, and when we were interacting with students and community members, we just made sure to highlight the fact that it is the 60-year anniversary of Shinerama, and the legacy that Shinerama has at Laurier,” said Rachel Mowe, a fourth-year Biology major and this year’s Shinerama coordinator.
Laurier’s Shinerama fundraiser takes place every Saturday of Orientation week. This year, Shinerama barbeques were held throughout orientation week from Sept. 1 to Sept. 7, alongside fundraising community sites through community walks on Sept. 7 and an appearance at the football home opener against the Guelph Gryphons at Knight-Newbrough Field.
“We had a booth set up, and we were interacting with community members and students that were coming out to the game,” said Mowe. “Shine Day this year was such an incredible event.”
Shinerama was started on Wilfrid Laurier University’s Waterloo campus in 1961 due to a suggestion by Paul Enns, the sophomore class president at the time. Enns was inspired to improve Laurier’s slate of orientation week events after being disappointed by the lack of events that made a positive impact in Waterloo.
“What the community expected from university students was that they did silly things, and they didn’t really contribute to the community in any significant way,” Enns said. “There were some local people whose children had cystic fibrosis, and at that time, life expectancy for kids with CF was around five or six years.”
According to Cystic Fibrosis Canada’s 2022 annual data report, cystic fibrosis is a progressive, degenerative multi-system disease that affects mainly the lungs and digestive system.
It impacts over 4,400 Canadians or one in 3,848 live births and has no cure.
In the 1960s, it was estimated that children with cystic fibrosis would not live long enough to finish high school, while today there are more adults that live with the disease than children.
Inspired to use his new role as sophomore class president to make a change in the Laurier and wider Waterloo community, Enns worked with the public relations director at the time to establish Sunbeam Shinerama, a shoe-shining event raising funds for Sunbeam House, now known as Sunbeam Community & Developmental Services.
Today, the organization provides inclusive living programs and services to those living in south-west and central Ontario. In its first year, Sunbeam Shinerama raised $1,400. At the event, students participating in the event would shine shoes for change using Coca-Cola boxes.
“At that time, they had wooden boxes which would hold a case of 24 bottles and we just flipped them over,” said Enns.
In 1964, Laurier partnered with Cystic Fibrosis Canada to run the event.
“The total that we gained at the end of orientation and Shine Day is not the final total for the year. We still have more work to do,” Mowe said.
Totals for Laurier’s Shinerama fundraiser this year have not been released yet, but fundraising is set to continue throughout the rest of the academic year.
