Passions were running high at the NCAA championship basketball game between the University of Michigan and Villanova University on April 2. But Meghan Klaric (MPP ’18) says some Villanova fans crossed the line when they hung a banner near campus that said, “The only lead @mich will have is in their water.”
As a Villanova alumna, and as a resident of Michigan, Klaric decided to counter the “cheap and tasteless joke” by creating a crowdfunding campaign on Crowdrise: “Villanova fans for Flint, MI.”
Klaric also wrote a letter to the editor, which was published in the student-run newspaper The Villanovan.
In both appeals, Klaric urges fans and alumni of Nova Nation to donate to the Foundation for Flint, a supporting organization of the Community Foundation of Greater Flint that was established to assist in Flint’s emergency and recovery from the water crisis.
“The Flint Water Crisis is ongoing and horrific,” Klaric writes. “The health problems caused by lead exposure are cumulative and incurable.”
“Villanovans, this is not us,” she continues, referring to the university’s motto: Veritas, Unitas, Caritas (truth, unity, love). “I know we are all opening our wallets right now to buy 2018 Championship hats and shirts and reprints of the front page of the Daily News. All I ask is that you open your wallets once more and donate a few dollars to help the children of Flint, MI.”
The fundraiser reached $3,215, exceeding its $3,000 goal.
- Klaric's efforts were featured by Ron Fonger in an April 13 article for MLive: "Villanova alumna uses sign that mocked water crisis to raise money for Flint."