The 40th annual Kirk Goodwin Run will take place Saturday and will benefit Dr. Cindy Roper, professor of communication, who suffered a stroke last year.
Roper has been a professor at ACU for 30 years and recently suffered from a rare spinal stroke that left her paralyzed from the waist down. The Kirk Goodwin run will raise money to cover Roper’s medical expenses and retirement. So far, over $15,000 has been raised.
Caleb Bichard, junior biology major from Lubbock, serves as director of the Galaxy Charitable Foundation and is coordinating the event.
“We’ve had the most sponsors this year than we’ve ever had before,” Bichard said.
The 5K run will start and end at Galaxy Park. Sign-in starts at 6 p.m., and the race itself starts at 7 p.m. Shirts for the run are $20 and can be purchased on the Galaxy Charitable website.
“Even if you didn’t buy a shirt, you can still come out and walk the run with us,” Bichard said.
The Kirk Goodwin Run was established in 1984 after Goodwin, who was a Galaxy member, fell asleep behind the wheel and was involved in a car crash. He died in the hospital shortly after. The members of Galaxy have hosted this run every spring since to fundraise for the local community.
Roper said she and Goodwin were enrolled at ACU at the same time, she was completing her master’s while he was a junior. Even though they never met, they still crossed paths. She had the opportunity to meet his sister and mother recently and was touched by his story.
Before coming to Abilene to teach, Roper was a missionary for many years. She said she has been overwhelmed by the support from the members of Galaxy.
“I’m so used to being on the other side of that,” she said. “It’s very strange being on the receiving side.”
March 25, 2023, started like any other day for Roper. While eating dinner, she was having some back pain. She went to lie down and realized that she needed some help because she found that her legs weren’t going to hold her up.
“I’ve been amazingly calm the whole time,” she said, adding her faith has gotten her through this experience. “Things happen to everybody, nobody gets through life without stuff. This is just the one I have to work through, and so I will.”
Bichard said the Kirk Goodwin run is different from other fundraising runs because of the personal connection Galaxy members have to this run.
“There are a lot of other fundraising things that are for great causes,” Bichard said. “Ours is for a great cause, as well. But it hits a little bit differently whenever it’s got a name on it that you’re connected to in some way.”
Bichard said this year’s run is special because, in addition to honoring Goodwin and fundraising for Roper, the fraternity will also unveil a plaque for Corbin Stiefer, a Galaxy member who died in a car wreck in 2021.
“We were in contact with his family, and they designed what they wanted the front of the plaque to look like,” Bichard said. “So we got it made for them and used funds from another fundraising event we had in the fall.”
