By Brian Storey

At first, Mulch Madness started as just a lacrosse fundraiser, but it quickly became a fundraiser for all the Oak Hall School sports teams. “Teams are awarded money from the fundraiser and donations according to how many volunteers they had and how long they worked for,” said Upper School Dean and head football coach RJ Fuhr when asked about the fundraiser. In past years, there was a barbecue and sport-specific games on the Friday before the mulch delivery. It was a great way to introduce younger kids to different sports as each sport had a game or drill run by current Oak Hall athletes. This year, however, there won’t be a barbecue and games. Instead, according to Oak Hall Athletic Director Edwin McTureous, “there will be an online game tournament. We don’t know what games, but it might last the whole weekend. But there definitely won’t be a barbecue because of safety precautions.”

The second half of the fundraiser is the mulch delivery, which is free within the Gainesville area on orders of 10 or more bags. Customers can order certain amounts of mulch and either come to campus to pick up their order, or have it delivered by parents and athletes. This is always a popular part for the students, which is very important because each year more and more mulch gets ordered. As far as the technical aspects of the mulch delivery, McTureous stated “We haven’t worked out all of the safety precautions yet because it is heavy work and we will be outside just like a football or soccer practice and kids don’t wear masks during those practices so, I think it would be about the same exposure.” 

Families can order mulch until Feb. 12 by visiting the Mulch Madness website, with pick-up and delivery on Feb. 20.