Featured event: First annual autism fundraiser at Sky Zone Newark

NEWARK - Tonight, the Sky Zone trampoline park will host the first in what it hopes to be an annual fundraiser for autism awareness.

Starting at 6 p.m., participants will kick off into a three-hour jump-a-thon, with first, second and third place winners for each age group named afterward.

Devon White, a sales and community outreach specialist at Sky Zone, said she hoped the event would raise at least $1,000 for Austism Delaware, a nonprofit that advocates for the community in the state. At most, the facility can hold 89 competitors.

"We don't have to sell it out," White said, "but we hope to have some kind of positive outcome."

For the fundraiser, Sky Zone has partnered with country radio station 94.7 WDSD, which will broadcast live from location from 6 to 8 p.m. Every 15 minutes, White said, WDSD will be giving away four-day passes to the Firefly Music Festival in June.

This event coincides with National Autism Awareness Month, and it comes partly as a result of Sky Zone's recurring sensory hours for jumpers with special needs. Autism Delaware has been persistent in promoting those hours, White said, and Sky Zone wanted to pay it forward.

Participants interested in the jump-a-thon fundraiser should come at 5 p.m. to get registered and settled in, she said. Once the jumping starts at 6 p.m., leaving the trampolines counts as disqualification.

For more information or to register, email devon.white@skyzone.com.