From left are Team Caroline’s Rich Graham, Chad Young, Jeff Keith, Sharon Arnold, Holly Walraven, Jade Rhudy, Dr. Lisa Logan, Sam Plottel, Chet Graham, Joel Svoboda, Cyndi Matheny and Diana Leun.On Dec. 14, 2012, the country was shaken when 20 children, ages 6 to 7, as well as six adult staff members were fatally shot at Sandy Hook Elementary School. Caroline Previdi was one of the students killed that day.
Since then, a foundation named in her honor has sprung up to help other children be able to afford extracurricular activities, and last month, Ringgold Primary School first-grade teacher Jade Rhudy received the Modern Woodmen’s Hometown Hero Award for her work with the organization.
“With Caroline being 6 years old, the age of the children I teach, it hits close to home,” she said. “We are a Title 1 school with a lot of low-income children. I think it’s great to help kids participate in something. Maybe it gets them off the streets; it helps them want to make better grades in school.”
Chet Graham, president of the Caroline Previdi Foundation, said the model of giving to others was set forth by young Caroline herself.
“Caroline always said, ‘We are not lucky, we are blessed,'” said Graham, who was born and raised in Ringgold. “Caroline gave her piggy bank of all the money she had been given for her birthdays and everything to her church for a toy drive for kids.”
Rhudy is being recognized for her efforts with Team Caroline, a group of local runners that competes in various events in honor of Caroline and to raise money for the foundation.
“We started Team Caroline in 2012,” Graham said. “My sister-in-law started it. We have raised $75,000 for the Caroline Previdi Foundation.”
Rhudy’s class at RPS recently raised $250 for the foundation, including $100 donated from Modern Woodmen’s Shane Catlett.
“I had a great group of parents and kids that were excited to be able to help raise money,” she said. “They were able to relate to it [helping children in need of extracurricular activities].”
She and the rest of Team Caroline run every day and do long runs on Saturday, according to Graham. They can be seen every morning at 5:15 a.m. in downtown Ringgold as they take the Ringgold Nature Trail or hit the streets through Bluffview Subdivision on their three- to 20-mile practice runs, he said.
Graham and fellow “teammates” Jeff Keith and Rich Graham just finished the Half Ironman for Team Caroline, and Keith and Rich Graham completed the full Ironman in 2014 and 2015 to help bring awareness to the foundation.
“We also just finished the Ragnar Tennessee, the Chattanooga-to-Nashville relay run,” Chet Graham said. “Team Caroline got first in the Masters Division and first in the Mixed Masters Division. We had 10 participants.”
Rhudy has run in three Ragnar events with Team Caroline over the years, and also ran with Team Caroline in the Chickamauga Marathon in 2014.
The next run for the “team” is this September, when Keith will again take on the full Ironman. And Chet Graham ran in the Boston Marathon this past April for Team Caroline.
“We sell tote bags and hats through Vineyard Vine for Team Caroline,” he said. “At the funeral we wore pink ties, and now Vineyard Vines makes pink ties with the foundation logo on it. The logo is a ribbon that makes a heart with her initials. Her full name was Caroline Phoebe Previdi.”
To learn more about the foundation or to donate, visit CarolinePrevidiFoundation.org or search for “Caroline Previdi Foundation” on Facebook.