Join host Meredith Davies, Rhodes, as she sits down with the awe-inspiring Riley Damiano, Rhodes: 2024 graduate, neuroscience major, health equity minor, dedicated advocate at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital and Fulbright Scholarship winner. Catch up with Riley about her Fulbright research grant in the Netherlands and discover why cancer research is more than just her passion—it's her mission!
Riley shares her touching story of how a little boy she never met became the driving force behind her dedication to pediatric cancer advocacy. Listen as she talks about her work as a student researcher at St. Jude and her deep connection to Tri Delta.
Discover how a beautiful coincidence led to Riley and Meredith reconnecting on the St. Jude campus and how Riley’s passion influenced her college experience. She opens up about how she inspired her chapter to give back, the importance of finding your “why” in philanthropy, and ways to support St. Jude even if you don’t live near Memphis.
Celebrate with them as they discuss reaching Tri Delta’s $100 million fundraising goal for St. Jude in just 25 years, and learn what’s next for Riley, including how to follow along on her upcoming study abroad adventures. This episode is packed with inspiration and a whole lot of philanthropic heart!
This transcript was created using automated technologies and may contain errors.
Hello, Tri Deltas and welcome to Let's Talk Tri Delta podcast. My name is Meredith Davies, Tri Delta’s Philanthropy Specialist and today I am here with a new Tri Delta graduate,
Riley Damiano she is a graduate of our Delta Psi chapter at Rhodes College. Also in Memphis, Tennessee, where Rhodes is, is St. Jude Children's Research Hospital.
Riley has done a lot of really cool stuff in her collegiate experience, and I don't want to spoil anything we're going to talk about, but that is your hint. So I am thrilled, honored,
grateful, and just so excited to welcome Riley to the podcast today. Riley began her advocacy for cancer at the young age of 12,
and soon she'll be heading to the Netherlands on a Fulbright research grant. How crazy, so cool. She is so accomplished, and she is just graduating from college. I'm so excited to talk to her today.
So please welcome Riley. Riley, please introduce yourself. - Of course. Hi, everyone. As Meredith mentioned, my name is Riley Damiano, and I just graduated from Rhodes this May,
and I'm a proud member of Pledge Class 2021 at Rhodes on the Delta Psi chapter. I had the privilege of, in addition to working with St. Jude as a philanthropy of Tri Delta nationally,
also had the opportunity to work there in their Department of Psychology and Biobehavioral Sciences for about two and a half years. So that really gave me the opportunity to not only get to work with St.
Jude in my capacity as a Tri Delta but also get to first hand see the incredible work that they're doing there. I mean, come on. Like every time I hear Riley speak,
she's just the coolest. She's doing such amazing work makes me feel like I I've accomplished nothing and I love that for her. So what you should know about Riley and I is that we're members of the same chapter.
We are road straddles to sisters and we sort of have this weird, not weird, invisible strings are not weird, but we have an invisible string kind of connection that keeps bringing us back together.
So my senior year, I recruited Maggie. Maggie is your big. Is that - Right, right. - Yeah, she is. - Tell us about Maggie. - I adore Maggie.
Maggie is one of, I remember as a member of Pledge Class 2021, our recruitment was entirely virtual and we hadn't gone to campus yet,
we have spring recruitment, so I hadn't met anyone in person yet, including Maggie, but I had gotten to know Maggie through our student government and really just admired her as a person and honestly decided to go through recruitment because she talked so positively about the Panhellenic community.
And I remember going through recruitment, falling in love with Tri Delta more generally, but then on Preference Night just getting to talk to Maggie and hear her why Tri Delta really solidified the decision for me that Tri Delta was the right Love her shoot.
So that was the coolest thing when I found out that that Maggie and Riley connected. I Was like, okay, Riley is someone I need to know then two years later I'm that I'm on staff at Tri Delta and I run into Riley at Tri Delta celebration at St.
Jude she's attending the event as a member of the Delta Psi chapter and that was the first time we met Then another two years pass and about a month and a half ago,
I'm on a St. Jude campus tour standing in front of the Danny Thomas bust in the research center, and Riley walks by and I'm with Sam,
our digital communication specialist. I'm like, "Sam, you have to meet Riley." I stopped her in the hall and we all reconnected, and that's how we got Riley to join us on the podcast.
And I mean, so many just invisible strings coming together. - Yeah, so Jeff, you got us here today. - Nice coincidence, especially being in front of that, Danny Thomas bust, just the tradition that goes along with that bust and you're supposed to go up to it and rub its nose for good luck.
And I know throughout my undergraduate career while working at St. Jude, I went there all the time and just knowing that like, in this like or just space inside of St. Jude, like just happening upon one another,
like a really beautiful coincidence to be completely honest. - So cool, the best. So I was just so excited that you agreed to join us on the podcast to share,
you know, all the wonderful things about you. So let's jump into some questions. - Sounds cool. So, I mentioned at the beginning of the podcast that you have been working in cancer advocacy since you were 12 years old,
so you have been supporting this for a long time, over a decade now. So, can you share with me how your journey started and how you started a fundraising initiative for a child you knew who was battling cancer?
Yeah, of course. So, Pediatric cancer is one of those things that pediatric cancer research and finding better options for treatment is something that's been really important to me for quite a long time now,
as you mentioned, now a little bit over a decade. And it all kind of came about because there was a little boy in my town. His name was Ty Lewis Campbell, and he was battling brain cancer. He was just under three years old when he was diagnosed.
And I was nine at the time and I remember his mom would write these daily blog updates about how he was doing and as a child myself, I couldn't fully understand how cancer was something that a child was being put through.
But one of the things that brought Ty a lot of joy was blue lollipops. So I remember as a child myself, I also really enjoyed the fact that like, when you ate a blue lollipop, it made your whole face blue and just like the simple joy of that.
And it was just was a small connection, even though I never met him in person. And unfortunately, he passed away when he was just five years old. And I continued to have this feeling of,
I don't come not being able to comprehend how this was something that a child was being faced with not only the cancer, but the treatments, having such horrific and awful side effects and being so outdated.
And I had the sense that I wanted to do something. So I decided to start this initiative called the Blue Lollipop Project under the Ty Lewis Campbell Foundation, which is run by his parents.
And it really over the past decade has just been the start of a really long path of ways that I've become more and more passionate about working with pediatric cancer patients and families impacted by pediatric cancer,
which ultimately led me to where I am today and was a really big part of me deciding to go to college in Memphis and join Tri -Delta, especially being the philanthropy of St.
Jude. Riley, that story just always blows me away with, you know, you were so young and could still, you know, you found your way to get involved and you made it child -like And you know,
that's one of the things I love about St. Jude is their focus on an emphasis on making cancer treatment better and letting kids be kids. And you knew that even at a young age and here you are continuing to do that work.
So tell me a little bit about the work that you're doing at St. Jude or the work you were doing in your time at St. Jude and and how that connected to your Memphis experience.
Yeah, of course. So I mentioned that I worked in the Department of Psychology and Biobehavioral Sciences for a really long time. I thought I wanted to go directly into finding better treatment options for kids with cancer.
But something that I realized about myself is that I really, not only am I interested in increasing survival and promoting better outcomes for kids with cancer,
but also making sure that kids with cancer aren't only able to survive, but are able to thrive after their treatment is over, which really led me to this neuropsychology lens.
So my research at St. Jude under Dr. Lisa Jekola was looking at how children with leukemia, their cognitive outcomes, as well as thinking about children who are diagnosed with cancer under the age of three years old and really just thinking about that early developmental period and how not only the cancer,
not only the treatment, but also being in the hospital, being away from home, the socioeconomic factors, how are all these things contributing to the cognitive developmental social behavioral outcomes that we're seeing in these kids?
And how can we intervene to promote healthier, better outcomes for them? Yeah, - I love that, growing up I definitely didn't feel like I knew,
I thought you were a child with cancer, you were saved and then everything was fine and everything went back to normal and honestly it wasn't until I got to know our other road to try to help sister Emily Hines that I learned that that was not the case and my view on childhood cancer changed completely.
And now I feel like I understand better. Obviously, there are still cancers out there that need to be cured, but it's not just curing the cancer. It's, you know, creating a better,
healthier, happier life for former patients and survivors. And Emily, Emily is actually my grand big. So, you know, of course she is.
Yes, I adore Emily as well and her story and just talking with her about her perspective has been was really amazing to have that input.
Yes I think I think I think there's something special about all Tri Delta chapters but I think there is something uniquely special, uniquely different about Rhodes Tri Delta and the experience that we get to have with St.
Jude and, you know, that deep connection we have with the hospital, I was a member mostly prior to COVID where we were going to campus and we went to Tri Delta Place.
We went to Target House and we visited with patients and we were on campus every year and we felt that impact as students, knowing patients who were students at Rhodes or just in the community and then even more so as Tri Deltas.
So I know you mentioned feeling that same way. Can you tell me more about how St. Jude and Tri Delta connect for you? Yeah, of course. So I felt really lucky,
especially in the aftermath of the height of COVID, to be able to have that really direct link between what we were fundraising for as Tri Delta 's and getting to see it firsthand.
I think about the fact that the building I worked in at St. Jude directly overlooked the Tri -Delta House and just being able to see families going in and out of there and really realizing that like, this is actually,
so like our money is going to something that has this measurable and direct impact and then also being able to walk through the hospital and just see how, just how intensive of care it is,
and knowing that these families in such a difficult part of their life aren't only getting help with the treatment being covered financially, but also really making sure that housing and transportation and food and all these things are able to be covered.
And I think that's, it's something that's unlike any other hospital I'm familiar with. And I felt really, I felt a sense of pride going to work at St. Jude, just knowing that for the very small piece of it that I played a role in,
my Tridalta sisters nationally were able to have this impact and able to contribute to this incredible place. Yeah, and how special that you were looking at Tridalta Place,
seeing patients enter every single day and we learned recently that you know it is thousands upon thousands of families that enter that building every single year and there are patients who don't ever want to stay anywhere else they just want to stay and try it all to place and it really does make that partnership super tangible for our members obviously you know we're funding everything St.
Jude does but it's it makes it feel really special to have that space with our name on it on campus, so. - Or just in there, I mean,
on my last day of work, I'd never had the opportunity just by a sense of like, I just hadn't physically gone in the space and I decided on my last day at St.
Jude in Memphis, I was going to walk in. In the past, it's not like I wasn't allowed to go in, but I just hadn't gone in. So That last day I walked in and the woman at the front desk says,
"How can I help you? Why are you here?" I said, "Oh, I'm a member of our local Tri Delta chapter. It's my last day working here at St. Jude in person." And I just wanted to see the space. And I remember on the wall from the Tri Delta celebration,
the year before it has the top fundraising chapters. And I remember seeing Rhodes College listed on there. and it just was this moment of like, wow, like,
and it's this absolutely gorgeous space and it really just made everything, especially being my last day at St. Jude on campus there, that much more meaningful and feeling like kind of a sense of closure in my time there.
It's beautiful. Wow. I'm so glad you went inside. I'm glad you just said, you know what, I'm going to go and I'm I'm gonna see it. For those of you who aren't familiar with what Tridelts Place is on the St.
Jude campus, it is a short -term housing facility for patient families. When they first arrive at St. Jude, that is generally the first place they go. It's a hotel -style living environment.
They serve breakfast in the building. It's sort of like a hotel in the lobby, like what you'd You'd see where like there's the complimentary breakfast area and there's yes,
these big plaques on the walls with our top fundraising chapters. There's a mirror with all of the chapter names on it. There's facts about our partnership in the building and I've only been inside,
I think twice. And the first time was when I was in college and I didn't know walking out that it was gonna take four years for me to get back inside because of COVID but every time I go inside,
every time I'm on campus, but especially every time I'm inside that building, just chills, goosebumps. It is really a powerful space. - Do you have any favorite memories from volunteering there?
Did you get to volunteer at the Tridel to house a lot when you were in college? - So I volunteered there once. Most of what we did was at Target House, but the one that's really close to Rhodes,
but we did go there one time. We always would do a craft and that craft, it was around, I guess, Dr. Seuss's birthday. So we were drawing or like coloring in cat in the hat and stuff like that.
But we had done all kinds of different projects and, you know, like put cut out a polar bear and then we'll put cotton balls all over it.
And I remember the first time I went was my freshman year. We used to have signups, like 10 spots, and it would go live in the Facebook and everybody would be like, oh my gosh, I can't get my spot as quickly as I can.
And I got a spot and I was talking to my roommate before I went and I was like, I feel like, and she was pre -med. I was like, I feel like I need to mentally prepare myself to go to this hospital. And she was like,
yeah, I think you probably do. I think it's gonna be sad. I think it's gonna be really hard. And I was like, okay, yeah, you're probably right. And I got back and I was like, it wasn't sad at all.
It was wonderful. It was empowering and these patients were happy and I met siblings and it was the best. And then anytime one of those came up, people probably thought I was so annoying.
I was on every single one of those I could go I was there so I feel very grateful that we were able to do that. I got to volunteer twice at the Target house once was for Halloween and I remember just getting to being like as a college student myself many of these patients I was only two three years older than so really getting to have conversations as well just like as peers and as like someone they're close to
their own age and just like catching up on like the latest pop culture stuff and really just being able to like have those conversations as well. And of course at the Halloween when I was running the lollipop pumpkin patch so getting to see the kids run the little little kids run around and pick lollipops out of the pumpkins just is so fun and so adorable and just seeing like the sense of community at those housing
places as And, yeah, it's just such a special place. Okay, so we talked about our favorite memories at St.
Jude, favorite tri -Delta St. Jude memory, a philanthropy event you did, something you loved at Rhodes. - Who, that would probably have to be Tri -Hawk.
I love Tri -Hawk. I, for the fur. We only had three years of it because you get recruited in the spring. And I remember my first year when I was a sophomore,
we decided to make it like rollerblading themed, like kind of like disco -y theme. No one actually ended up wearing rollerblades. There's a conversation.
There's a conversation about that. I don't think the refectory was a fan of us roller through our dining hall, the the rat. But I just remember I was in charge of the toppings that year and we did the tri -deltas special which was all the toppings and the number of people that were ordering the tri -deltas special we were like oh my goodness we're gonna run out of strawberries and just the sense of like this like And
then this past year, we did a pancake eating contest where all the fraternities got to nominate a member to who could eat the most pancakes. I think it was in two minutes. And one of the fraternities,
their member ate something like 18 pancakes in two minutes. And you just see me in the background of the video they took just like. - I've seen that video actually.
- Like he was just folding them and stuffing them in his mouth, and just like, it's those types of memories that are like, okay, this is everyone at school comes to this,
isn't just the Tri Deltas or just the Panhellenic community or even just the Greek community in general, like everyone comes to it and was cheering around that table and coming to this event. So yeah,
I always love TriHop. - Yeah, TriHop at Rhodes is really cool. Roads is a small school, like 2 ,000 students. We have one dining hall.
The rat, as Riley said, it does actually have a little rat statue outside of it. And I don't know if it's still the same, but when I was in school,
the chefs and cooks at the rat, they made all the pancakes for us and not anymore. We make the pancakes. So it's like days in advance that we're cooking like thousands of pancakes,
which is also an adventure of its own. We always blow like at least one fuse in the house. Oh, yeah. So it's expected at this point. Yeah, yeah, we would pre -make some.
So I am familiar with sitting, I was sitting on the floor with my Gretel having pancakes in the house in the living room. Yes. But then every like literally everybody showed up. Every member of a great organization,
people on every single sports team, faculty, staff, their kids, it's so cool. It is such a special, Memphis is a special place to support St.
Jude. It's a special place to be a tri -Delta. And it was moments like that where I just felt really supported in the work that we were doing and it felt like everyone believed in the commission of St.
Jude and the work that we were putting into it. And it was always just so fun. - Love it. - Yeah, try hot, yes. Speaking of fundraising, can you believe what's happening right now?
Can you believe that we have just raised $100 million for St. Jude in 25 years? - It's amazing. I mean, when I heard the news, I was, I mean, I didn't have any doubt that we would be able to do it because I we're tried out to,
of course we're gonna meet our goal, but I think that actually hearing that we met the goal was just a whole new level of like,
wow, this sense of achievement that we collectively as this organization, we did this. Like even if your chapter only raised a couple thousand dollars or $10 ,000 or whatever it is,
like it all adds up, which it makes such an impact. And I'm thrilled that we met the goal. - Yeah, it is, I mean, absolutely incredible.
We are just, for the most part, women under the age of 23, doing so much of this fundraising work and our alumni supporting as well.
But it is all, you all, it is not somebody writing a big check to St. Jude. It is our members flipping pancakes, writing sincerely yours letters,
doing walk runs. And we're saving lives, truly saving lives. And that is so cool. And I know that you had talked about a unique way that you were able to help some students at Rhodes find a way to give back to St.
Jude a little differently. Can you tell me Yeah, of course. So, um, early this year, um, St. Jude had put out this announcement that they were running low on blood donations,
and they put out this infographics saying something to the effect of, for every whole blood donation that they have to purchase outside of St.
Jude, as it not donated directly to St. Jude, it costs about dollars. And for every platelet donation, it costs somewhere between $500 and $750.
And that's a lot of money. And it kind of hit me that like, okay, we're college students, a lot of us don't just have $250 sitting in our back pocket, that we can just like hand to St.
June and say go get a bag of blood to save a child's life quite literally. But we do have the ability we are the prime age and prime demographic to be donating this blood.
So I talked about it a lot with the other women in my chapter to think about like, hey, why don't we go and donate blood? Like, yeah, maybe I can't donate $250 right here right now,
but I can take less than an hour out of my day and go and donate blood and quite literally know that my blood is going to be something that and it sounds really grandiose but like quite literally is going to save someone's life um so I remember being that I was able to work at st.
Jude um I was able to kind of facilitate this you don't have to work at st. Jude to donate blood there but um I was able to carpool and just see my sorority sisters and then it went outside of that and we had people just from the roads community in general going and donating blood.
It was really great to be able to make that connection go up to the people at the donation center and say like hey like we're from the local tri delta chapter and like we genuinely care and want to make this difference and for those of you out there who don't live in the Memphis area like donating blood just generally is such an important way to help your local hospital,
whether it's a children's hospital or otherwise? I, Riley, I spend a lot of time trying to help our members find their "why" in philanthropy,
whether that's with St. Jude, Tridel's Foundation, whatever it is, but just working on that, you know, what's your, what's your story? How do you, obviously, we want to save every child from childhood cancer.
But like, what is your special connection? And I think the experience that you gave people in donating blood, knowing that that was literally saving a child's life,
you helped people find their way in supporting St. Jude. And that is so meaningful for so many people. Like you help them find their personal connection, a shared experience.
these are things that really matter and we are saving lives and I just think you've just done so many cool things and I'm just saying everything you've done. So you graduated.
How was that? It was surreal. I mean we didn't get a real high school graduation so being able to we get to walk across the seal for the first time at Rhodes.
There's a seal that you don't walk across until you graduate and I think it really just hit me like wow like we made it it was a tough four years I mean our first semester of college wasn't in person we were at home um but we made it and we're here and now I'm so I miss my friends dearly and I keep in contact with them on almost a daily basis but being able to think of like what's ahead just like gives me so
much hope and excitement, and there's so much possibility. Yeah. Riley, I graduated during COVID also, but I graduated during COVID.
They sent us a box in the mail with a little graduation box, and it had a seal on a piece of paper that you could walk across.
And I took all my COVID anger out on that thing. I jumped on top of bit ripped in half and eventually I walked across the seal I think like a year later but yeah I was like this is terrible so I can relate to not having a graduation so you graduated you're at home right now there's a bear in your yard right now the the pleasures of living in rural -ish New York yeah apparently there's currently a mama bear and
four cubs in my backyard. So, you know. - That's crazy, that is crazy. - It's that type of day. - Really, I didn't know that you were a Memphis transplant like me.
I came from New Jersey. How did you find yourself at Rhodes? - I mean, it's St. Jude. Like to be completely honest, I cared a lot about pediatric cancer research.
I said, where is a school that can, I wanted a school that was small in a city, had a good sense of community, but I also wanted a school that had good access to a children's hospital where I could do research.
And I remember just thinking like, oh, like let's look up, what colleges are near St. Jude? Like that's like the top tier pediatric cancer hospital. Like maybe there was a college near there. And then I found Rhodes and I fell in love.
Like - Rhodes was the perfect place for me. Just the sense of community there and the small community, but in that big city with so much possibility.
It was, I wouldn't have chosen to go elsewhere. - I love it. Riley really is Miss Rhodes. Like, I feel like I saw you on the Rhodes Instagram. You were in the graduation post,
weren't you? - I think so, I don't know. I think you are, she's a star, she's famous, she's ours. So, okay, now what's coming up? What's on the horizon for you? - Yeah,
so I am headed out this August to the Netherlands to as part of a Fulbright to go do research, neuropsychology research at Princess Maxima Center for Pediatric Oncology.
So continuing with this passion for pediatric oncology research. The Netherlands has the largest pediatric cancer research center in all of Europe. So that's what drew me to apply there for the Fulbright and never in a million years that I think it would actually come to fruition and that I would win the Fulbright.
But here I am and I'm beyond excited not only to get to do this incredible research but also get to study abroad as that's something I didn't get the chance to do in college.
So, yeah, I am so excited to get to continue working on neuropsychology research, in this case to support kids with brain tumors and thinking about their cognitive outcomes when it comes to treatment and what other factors and variables are involved in predicting per say their cognitive outcomes.
Yeah, it's just, it's continuing with this really meaningful journey and I can trace it all back. It all ties together to this original connection to this little boy named Tai and then to St.
Jude and then to Treadelta and now taking that passion to the Netherlands, I'm very excited. - Wow, yeah, talk about an invisible string.
This connected everything in your life and you you know, work that really matters and thank you very much of you. I like to say it's all for Ty. I always use the hashtag hashtag all for Ty because even though I never met him,
it's really he had a TRT type of really aggressive brain cancer and just thinking about like how this little boy who I never met has really helped drive my life's purpose and my passion.
Yeah, I, what, what an amazing why. And I mean, so incredible that you continue to honor him in everything that you do. And, you know,
hopefully we, we get to a point where children who get that same cancer will be cured. And that's what we all have to just keep striving for. And one day,
one day we'll get there, one day, one day it won't be four and five, one day we'll get to the day that it's nine and 10. And, you know, I hear so much about St. Jude global and here you are going out to the world to do global work.
And I just think it's all so wonderful, but from a, you said you never got to study abroad. So what else are you excited to do in the Netherlands besides cancer research,
which is, you know, really Tell me, tell me the fun stuff. - Oh yeah, no, I mean, I've been making with the cohort of Fulbrighters, I'm going with Feeble Hole. Shared list of things we're going to go do.
Things like skating on the canals. Not sure how that one's going to go. Anyone who knows me personally knows I am very clumsy. At one point,
one of my Tridalta sisters, I was actually going ice skating and she was like, let's bet on how long it takes you to fall on ice in a very loving way. But she was so right, I fell within the first five minutes.
We're gonna go see the tulip fields. I mean, it's also just, it's Europe. So everything's so close to one another. I mean, a train from Amsterdam to Paris is three hours.
So I plan to see as much as I can and really just like immerse myself there as like someone living there rather than just like going as a tourist.
- That's awesome, Riley. We are just so excited for everything that you have on the horizon. We're so grateful for everything you've already done. So grateful to have you as a sister. Where can we keep following along on your journey to the Netherlands?
- Yeah, of course. So you can follow me. I have an Instagram that I've created for my time abroad. It's Riley's .dutchadventures.
I think Riley's .dutchadventures. - Don't buy it. - Yeah, it's me, you know. So I'm so excited to kind of like use that account to really share the things that mean the most to me while I'm abroad and also just have a place to kind of like journal and scrapbook my time while I'm there.
I love it. Riley, thank you so much for chatting with us. Thank you so much for having me. This has been such a pleasure to talk with you. We just are so proud of everything that you're doing and I am so looking forward to continuing to follow your journey.
I feel like on social media for like five years almost, well, four years. And I just can't wait to see all the wonderful things you do in the Netherlands and then beyond.
I know that you are going to save lives and make lives better. And I can tell that you're a wonderful friend and a great Tri Delta . So thank you so much for hanging out with me today.
So everyone keep an eye out for what's next with St. Jude. We might have another announcement coming at convention, so we'll be on the lookout for that.
Please, as always, like, subscribe, and rate our podcast. We love five star ratings. Thank you so much for joining us. Until next time, delta love.