BATON ROUGE — The LSU women’s soccer and gymnastics teams participated in the Baton Rouge Junior League’s annual “Storytime” Festival at the Louisiana Arts and Science Museum last Saturday.
The student-athletes met with the children, aged eight and under, and signed posters and trading cards for more than 1,500 participants at the event. Women’s soccer players Caroline Vanderpool, Melissa Clarke, Sara Pollock, Sammy Sanderson and Casey Crawford were among the student-athletes who participated, along with gymnasts April Burkholder, Terin Martinjak, Lisa Rennie, Ashleigh Clare-Kearney, Tina Suhr, Vanessa Rodriguez, Kelly Lea, Kelly Phelan and Amanda Morales.
At the event, professional storytellers and published children’s book authors read to the children while the kids participated in arts and crafts activities. The theme of the 2006 event was “Clifford the Big Red Dog”, who made a special appearance at the free event.
The student-athletes participated in the event as part of the Shaquille O’Neal CHAMPS/Life Skills program. The CHAMPS (Challenging Athletes Minds for Personal Success)/Life Skills Program was designed by the NCAA to help student-athletes realize higher academic achievement, increase likelihood of graduation and enter a chosen profession with a higher level of vision, knowledge, motivation, self-responsibility and greater overall success. In Spring 2003, the CHAMPS/ Life Skills Program at LSU honored one of the Tigers’ most memorable graduates, Shaquille O’Neal, by naming the program after him.