O'Dea allows beards to fight cancer in student's memory

Seattle's O'Dea High School is battling something much bigger than a football, basketball or baseball opponent this St. Patrick's Day. The Fighting Irish are fighting cancer through a fundraising effort called Beards for Bros.

Ever since O'Dea was founded in 1923, the Catholic high school has had a strict facial hair policy. According to the school's appearance code: "Students must be clean-shaven with sideburns not below the ear." 

Students at the all-boys school who repeatedly come to class without shaving can even receive detention. Senior Logan Flones told KIRO 7 his math teacher is particularly strict about it. 

"He's called me up to the front of class, looked really closely, given my face a rub and said, nope, gotta go shave," at least a dozen times in the past two years, Flones said.

Flones even keeps an electric razor in his locker.

But for the month of March, any student able to raise $100 or more is being allowed to ditch his razor.

Senior Robbie Jo Gerarden is one of the organizers of Beards for Bros. Last October, Gerarden said he and a few other seniors thought "the beards would be a great catalyst to spark conversation about this cause we're really trying to advocate for.

Junior Theodore Looney told KIRO 7 he has a sister who goes to Holy Names and all her friends are saying, "Wow! You're growing a beard!"

Beards for Bros was established to raise money for Seattle Children's Adolescent & Young Adult Cancer Program, where O'Dea student Josh Dickerson was treated before the baseball stand-out ultimately lost his battle with cancer in 2012.

Beards for Bros "is definitely something Josh would have found worthy of fighting for," teacher and assistant baseball coach Alex Lara told KIRO 7. Dickerson's #2 jersey still hangs in a hall at O'Dea, in front of the baseball trophy case and head baseball coach Mike Doyle's classroom. 

Doyle said Dickerson's drive to compete on the baseball diamond, even while enduring excruciating pain, was the inspiration for O'Dea's first-ever Beards for Bros. 

"We can continue to recognize him and his fight, and just what he means to us as a school," Doyle told KIRO 7 Reporter Amy Clancy.

What kind of beard would Josh have been able to grow?" 

"A patchy one,"  Doyle laughed. "Not a very full one, but he would have tried."

Not only is this the first year of Beards for Bros, it's also the first year O'Dea has been divided into four separate all-age student "houses." Teacher Larkin Temme said the competition between the four houses has inspired participation in Beards for Bros.

"We're doing it through a healthy competition," she said.  "A boy-friendly, healthy competition."

Beards for Bros will end on March 30th when the winners of various beard-growing and fund-raising categories will be named.

O'Dea students and teachers hope Beards for Bros will become an annual tradition. Visit the Beards for Bros website for more information.

KIRO