Despite this year providing significant personal challenges to the Freeze family and the Payton’s Project board, we made this year count.
In February, we opened our scholarship applications earlier than we’ve been able to before. Over the next couple months, we received an unprecedented number of applications, and were able to award 29 students with scholarship funds. This is more than we’d ever even hoped to share, and each of those applicants truly deserved the award. The quality of the applications this year and the difference that many these students have made in their communities is worth celebrating, and our scholarship committee is honored to have been trusted with their stories. We’re proud to be part of these peoples’ continuing education.
We have also been able to secure the funds and necessary documentation to put a new Wellness Room in another Virginia High School! These spaces have made a measurable difference for our youth in developing healthy ways of dealing with their struggles in and out of the classroom.
As this program has become more and more necessary, it has also grown beyond our organization’s ability to keep up in many cases. The establishment of a new room has become a challenge for us to secure, but with this one, we hope to continue expanding this program in a way we can maintain.
And finally, our two largest fundraisers for the year have both been successes!
In September, we had our golf scramble, put on by one of Payton’s uncles in Dayton, Ohio. This year we saw 20 teams of both old and new faces, and enjoyed watching everyone having a good time on the course. We’re already looking forward to next year!
In October, we had the annual Freeze Bullying Softball Tournament, where the weather just barely held out for 26 teams to play over the course of the weekend. We were lucky to have several members of the Freeze family at the site this year, and got to have some really meaningful conversations with players and their families as they stopped by the booth or just stopped to talk as we walked around the park.
As we head into the holidays and toward the end of the year, we’re glad to see what we’ve accomplished this year, and we hope to continue making a difference into 2026. It’s sometimes an unkind world out there, but we’ve seen kindness from many people who have made life a little better for someone else. And we hope that you’ll join us in putting an end to bullying and helping people deal with it. As always–It Starts With You!