'Movember' at NSAC

Students and staff of NSAC participated in an international challenge to raise funds for Prostate Cancer Canada by growing a moustache during the month of November.

As a result, $1,883 was raised for Prostate Cancer Canada!

"Basically, we started with no facial hair on the first day of November and then we let our moustaches grow while keeping everything else shaved," explains NSAC student and coordinator of the program, Shawn Loo.

The month of November was unofficially changed to Movember, because Mo is Aussie slang for Moustache. It all started down under in 2003, when a group of friends enjoying their favourite brews decided that it was time to bring back the moustache. They decided to use their love of the moustache to raise money for prostate cancer research. Since then it exploded in popularity in Australia. Today it is quickly taking over the world with national campaigns in countries like theUK, Ireland, the US,New Zealand and of course Canada.

This years Movember campaign saw a huge increase in participants.

One of the reasons for this year’s growth is the introduction of the Big Mo On Campus (BMOC) campaign, which now has participants literally everywhere in Canada.

“There were 40 BMOC schools involved with 101 teams registered accounting for no less than 1850 campus Mo Bro’s and Mo Sista’s right across the country," explained BMOC coordinator Stephen Loo.

At NSAC there were five BMOC teams; one in each residence, an off-campus students team and a faculty and staff team.

One in six men will be diagnosed with prostate cancer in their lifetime, which makes it the most common form of cancer for Canadian men. Dean of Teaching and Learning and Professor Norman Goodyear was the captain of the staff and faculty team and knows these facts all too well.

“In addition to family members I have known several others who have also died as a result of prostate cancer,” said Goodyear. “When the disease is detected at the advanced stage, life expectancy and quality of life are cut short,” he added. Goodyear himself is in a high risk category for developing the cancer which has a 90 per cent cure rate if detected early.

Photo caption: Dr. Kevin Sibley (Class of '80) shows off his "mo" as part of NSAC's faculty and staff team.