High School students raised funds for the visually impaired

Skiers from Cedarburg High School in Wisconsin recently donated $6,500 to Foresight Ski Guides, the Colorado-based nonprofit that takes blind and visually- impaired people skiing on Vail Mountain. The Cedarburg High School ski team raised the funds at its fourth annual Ski Foresight Benefit Race earlier this ski season at the Sunburst, a ski area in Kewaskum, Wis.

Foresight Ski Guides founder Mark Davis, Mike Francisco of Gypsum, student Jaycey Brab, guide Mark Masto, student Lindsay Backes and guide Jan Masto were around one day last month when the students gave the nonprofit skiing organization a $6,500 check.Cedarburg High School seniors Lindsay Backes and Jacey Brab, who headed up the fundraising activities, visited Vail to present the $6,500 check to Mark G. Davis, Foresight Ski Guides' founder and president, and to ski with blind and visually-impaired people.

"It was great to be able to see what happened to the money we raised by skiing with a totally blind person one day and a partially-blind person the next day," said Backes, 17. "It was amazing to see the trust that had been built up between the skiers and their guides and realize just how much training the guides had gone through to be able to develop that trust." For the past four years, the Cedarburg High School ski team has raised more than $15,000 for Foresight Ski Guides, said Janet Levy, who retired last year as community service coordinator for Cedarburg High School.

"Our goal was to acquaint the kids with the importance of community service and we were looking for things that would give them leadership skills, give their lives some dimension and help them grow into caring young adults," Levy said. "It was a natural fit that the ski team would do something for blind and visually-impaired skiers who otherwise wouldn't be able to experience the joys of skiing without Foresight Ski Guides," she said.

The charity race not only involved ski racers from throughout Wisconsin but also members of Wisconsin Bold, a nonprofit that enables blind and visually-impaired people to experience outdoor sports and leisure activities while developing their social and athletic skills."We are honored that these high school kids chose Foresight Ski Guides as the benefactor of their hard work," said Davis, who founded Foresight Ski Guides in 2001 after losing his functional vision due to a rare symptom of multiple sclerosis. "Their enthusiasm as they skied with two visually-impaired people during their Vail visit was inspiring," he said.