Grand Valley professor to bicycle 2,000 miles to build orphanage

GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — John Shinsky, associate professor of education at Grand Valley State University, will bike 2,000 miles to Matamoros, Mexico, to raise money to build an orphanage for abused children.

Shinsky will get some help from two friends who were his football teammates at Michigan State University in the 1970s. Joe DeLamielleure, who became an NFL Hall of Famer and Eljay Bowron, who became the head of the Secret Service, will share in the bike ride to raise $500,000 — the amount needed to finish the first phase of the orphanage.

The three will begin their 18-day journey Saturday, April 25, at halftime of MSU’s spring football game at Spartan Stadium in East Lansing.

Shinsky said money raised will help complete the 12-building, 33,000-square-foot facility that will provide a home, food, safety, education and bilingual and vocational training for hundreds of children.

“These children are abandoned and physically, sexually and emotionally abused,” said Shinsky, who spent part of his childhood in an orphanage. “I’d vowed early in my life to help orphans because of the great support my foster family provided me after I left the orphanage.”

Shinsky began working on “The City of Children of Matamoros Mexico” project four years ago.

For more information visit www.orphanagefundraiser.com or contact John Shinsky at (616) 331-6682 or GVSU News and Information Services at (616) 331-2221.