“I look up and it’s like Star Wars overhead,” said Marine Second Lieutenant J.J. Konstant, reflecting on an experience in the Middle East. An Afghani insurgent force attacked Konstant’s platoon in the Kunar Province of northeastern Afghanistan as Konstant enjoyed his first hour of sleep in days.
One of his Marines pulled him off the ground, and Konstant scrambled up a nearby hill. “I’m laying down. I’m in my underwear, my T-shirt, my boots, and I’ve got my rifle,” he said. “I mean, it’s like a classic scene out of 'The Dumb Lieutenant.'”
Konstant – now a captain with medals, ranging from Purple Hearts to a Bronze Star – delivered a speech on leadership at the Norris University Center Thursday. The event was a fundraiser sponsored by Northwestern Uplifting Athletes to raise money and awareness for the rare disease Niemann-Pick Type C.
“We’re just really excited to have J.J. with us and give a good talk about leadership,” said Quentin Williams, Weinberg junior and marketing director of Northwestern Uplifting Athletes.
Konstant’s talk centered around the theme of leadership, and he made his points by telling the story of his involvement in Operation Whalers in Afghanistan.
The operation was a response to Operation Red Wings, in which 19 soldiers – including a number of special forces – were killed in the summer of 2005. Several months later, Operation Whalers went into effect to finish the mission: to disrupt or eliminate the actions of Ahmad Shah and his insurgent force.
One of the highest ranking officers in the operation, he still remembered the name of every one of his men that he mentioned, and would often add the man’s rank and hometown. At one point in the story, Konstant even moved his platoon out of what would have been a deadly ambush and instead lost zero men.
With these stories, Konstant taught values of leadership to a crowd of about 25. He said, “leadership is the art of influencing and directing men and women so as to obtain their willing respect, confidence, obedience and loyal cooperation in order to accomplish the mission."
“When a team wins, it’s the team’s win," he added. "When a team loses, it’s usually the leader that deals with that burden.”
Northwestern Uplifting Athletes is trying to bring that attitude to its fight against rare diseases. “This talk on leadership really resonated with all of our base dynamics,” Williams said.
Created in 2003, Uplifting Athletes is run by former Pennsylvania State University football player Scott Shirley, whose father was diagnosed with kidney cancer. When learned that few treatment options remained, Shirley realized that rare diseases needed more funding for research.
Now, the organization is active or in the process of being installed at 16 universities across the country, from Ohio State University to Boston College to Princeton University. Each chapter is run mainly by the school’s football team and chooses a different rare disease on which to concentrate fundraising.
Northwestern’s chapter is in honor of former Northwestern football coach Ara Parseghian. Williams said, “[Parseghian] was actually our honorary captain for one of our games two years ago, and that kind of spurred the inspiration for us because getting to meet him and sharing his story was really pretty cool.”
In addition to this speech, Northwestern Uplifting Athletes will hold a Lift for Life event in July, where fans can make donations to watch the team compete in training exercises.
“It’s really just a bunch of athletes out putting on a good show for fans," Williams said.
In its second year on campus, the organization is looking to expand and incorporate more non-football players as it fights to create funding for traditionally underfinanced rare diseases. It has already received help from the Wildside, which donated its $5,000 winnings of the Big Ten Home Court Challenge to the organization.
“A Division I Big Ten athlete has a pull, and [Shirley] wanted to use that,” Williams said. “So what better way than to raise money for something like this?”