Will Baxter's father lives with a rare heart disease. That personal connection drove the recent New Trier graduate to build something no high school had done before: a chapter of Uplifting Athletes, the college-level nonprofit that channels competitive sports into rare disease fundraising.
On Tuesday, June 23, more than 70 New Trier football and basketball players packed the Winnetka campus fieldhouse for the school's second annual Lift for Life event, raising more than $24,000 for Uplifting Athletes. That total more than doubled the $11,000 raised in the program's inaugural year.
Baxter and fellow 2026 graduate Jacob Wineman launched the chapter in 2025 after Baxter attended an Uplifting Athletes event with his father. Through the nonprofit, the two attended a Chicago Sky game alongside three Northwestern football players. The experience convinced Baxter to bring the program home.
"We saw they had the Lift for Life at the college level but not at the high school level, so we asked," Baxter told The Record North Shore. The Uplifting Athletes president agreed, and a staff member named Faith helped set up the first chapter in 2025.
New Trier is the first high school in the country to participate in Lift for Life, which had operated only at the college level since the nonprofit's founding in 2007. Jeff Baxter, a representative of Uplifting Athletes (no relation to Will), told The Record North Shore that New Trier's chapter allowed the organization to build a framework it plans to replicate at high schools nationwide.
Inside the fieldhouse
Athletes split into 10 teams and competed in bench presses, obstacle courses, and medicine ball throws. A tug-of-war competition determined the overall winner. Jim Davis, New Trier's Athletic Coordinator for Strength and Conditioning, helped organize the event alongside the students.
Davis said the initiative fits the weight room's culture. "We have a mantra in the weight room: 'Know the way, go the way, show the way to others,'" he told The Record North Shore. "They've worked really hard at every step, so they're passing along their understanding and their good work in a fun way."
Passing the torch
With Baxter and Wineman graduated, rising senior Rick Miller will lead the chapter during the 2026–27 school year. Miller was involved in the 2025 launch and took a larger organizing role in 2026, pushing for full participation across both teams.
Uplifting Athletes, based in Philadelphia, has raised more than $11 million since 2007 to support the roughly 30 million Americans affected by rare diseases (conditions each affecting fewer than 200,000 people).
North Shore schools week ahead
Monday, July 13 — New Trier District 203 Board of Education regular meeting. Multipurpose Room C234, Northfield Campus, 7 Happ Road, Northfield. Open session at 5 p.m.; regular business at 6:30 p.m. Agenda includes approval of June 1 meeting minutes and May 2026 financial reports.
