LEAD WT and Helping Hearts of West Texas A&M University sought to find a way for people to come together and raise money for the awareness of domestic and sexual violence. These organizations found a fundraising outlet through their first golf tournament held on Friday, April 10.

“Awareness is key and it’s the most important thing,” Meagan Brown, leader of LEAD WT, said. “I originally came up with the idea of the tournament because we needed a really good fundraiser for Helping Hearts and I thought it could allow us a lot of opportunities to network and really connect with people in the community. We have to be aware of what’s happening around us and we have to care about others.”

In preparation for the tournament, Brown and approximately 30 other active student members prepared for the tournament and learned the different challenges of organizing a fundraiser.

“This event has really presented a nice challenge for us,” Brown said. “So much more work has gone into it than what I thought. It’s been great learning how to set up fundraisers, but I’ve failed a lot too. I feel like I’ve gotten a lot out of doing this, and my team feels the same way.”

The group started setting up the event at 10 a.m. the morning of by getting t-shirts, golf tees and golf carts ready for the tournament.

“I’ve been a part of LEAD now for a full year and it’s great,” Landry Morren, LEAD WT member, said. “We have put on different kinds of fundraisers before, but nothing like this. We got out here around 10 to set things up like get the golf carts ready for the teams and just have all the tables out that we needed to get ready. We just want to raise enough awareness and money as possible.”

Tee off started at 1 p.m. and ended around 5:30 p.m. that night. Director of the Palo Duro Creek Golf Course, Casey Renner, said the event was impressive and was pleased with the cause the tournament was supporting.

“The tournament started out to a great start,” Renner said. “It’s a great thing what they are doing, and I think that this awareness should have been addressed a long time ago and should continue to be addressed even after this tournament. I think it’s good that finally they are helping out these people.”

LEAD WT and the Helping Hearts hope to host more fundraisers in the future.

“We usually get into groups of four and pick a cause which we want to raise towards like this one. Here in a few weeks we will be hosting a 5k run for another organization that we pick so that should have a good turnout as well,” Morren said.