University at Buffalo - The State University of New York

Faculty and staff ride for Roswell

UB faculty and staff are perennial participants in the Ride for Roswell. Photo: NANCY J. PARISI

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By JULIE WESOLOWSKI

Published: May 13, 2009

Hundreds of UB faculty, staff, students and friends will come together on June 27 as the UB Spirit team and raise money for cancer research during the 14th annual Ride for Roswell. But for some UB Spirit team members, the ride means so much more than just a day of fund raising and exercise.

For Katie Menke, assistant technical director at the Center for the Arts (CFA), the ride is a way to honor her mother, who passed away in 2001 after a battle with cancer. As team captain, she leads her “motley crew” of family, friends and co-workers through the 33-mile route.

This year, Menke thinks her team may be growing with the addition of CFA staff. “Several of them have had cancer in their family, so they understand and want to get involved,” she explains.

Menke, in her fourth year of participating in the Ride for Roswell, which begins and ends at Baird Point on the North Campus, also rides the Peloton route—an extra 12-mile circuit reserved for cyclists who raise $1,000 or more.

Supporting Roswell through the ride is very personal to Menke, who watched her mother suffer through harsh chemotherapy treatments and hopes the money raised can fund more advances in cancer treatment or even a cure.

“I’m really hoping that through these fund-raising efforts and through the work that Roswell is doing, they can help those in the future so that families don’t have to go through what we did.”

Admissions advisor Tim Matthews will be participating in his fourth Ride for Roswell. But this year, the ride has taken on a whole new meaning. Tim’s UB Spirit teammate and training partner for the past three years, UB alum Mike Klenosky, spent the past year fighting cancer and now has a clean bill of health. The experience really hit home for Matthews.

“It was so weird for someone who raises money with me every year and then to have him go through it and to be treated at Roswell Park after raising all that money. They helped him out. Here he is,” Matthews says.

In her fifth year as a cyclist in the Ride for Roswell, Jackie Ghosen, assistant dean and director of communications for the School of Management, is bringing her son and husband and a family friend along for the ride this year. She also is assembling a group of her management colleagues to join her for the ride.

Ghosen started out thinking the Ride for Roswell was a nice way to stay involved with UB and a good way to support an organization she thinks highly of. But during the past couple of years, the ride has hit much closer to home. Her father and two of her friends are battling cancer—all of whom have been given good prognoses. And Ghosen also recently lost an aunt and a parishioner to the disease.

Ghosen feels proud to be part of a team that is as large and raises as much money as the UB Spirit team, but still thinks there’s still more work to be done to support Roswell. “I feel like we just have to pedal harder ever year.”

Faculty and staff can click here to join the UB Spirit team. UB is a corporate sponsor for the Ride for Roswell.