(WACO) — Some 200 Texas State Technical College students, faculty and staff gathered recently at a cookout to raise money for Billy Anthony III, son of TSTC employees Cheryl and Tony Lloyd.

Anthony has battled multiple sclerosis for seven years, and the fundraiser raised more than $900 to help alleviate some of the financial burden associated with his illness.

“His diagnosis caught us so off guard. He was a healthy, happy, blonde-haired, blue-eyed young man,” Cheryl Lloyd said. “And even now when you see him, he is still so positive, and if he thinks something is wrong with you, he will ask if he can pray for you.”

Lloyd is a lab assistant for the TSTC Electrical Lineworker program. When students learned that her son was given a terminal diagnosis, they wanted to help. They reached out to Letha Novosad, lead instructor in TSTC’s Building Construction Technology program, to find a way to help Lloyd and her husband, Tony, an instructor in TSTC’s Electrical Power and Controls, with the burden of their son’s final expenses.

“Cheryl is such a kind and giving person, and she gives her all to the Electrical Lineworker program so that the department really sees her as the mom over there,” Novosad said. “And I would do anything for her and her family because she just inspires good.”

Novosad reached out to the TSTC Faculty Senate and The TSTC Foundation, whose members acquired food and drinks to be sold. The Electrical Lineworker Technology students furnished baked goods to sell, and students from various TSTC programs volunteered to go to classrooms with goods to promote the fundraiser.

“It’s for one of our own. It’s a good cause, and they needed help,” said Eric Roen, a second-semester Electrical Lineworker Technology major student.

For more information about Anthony, his family and an opportunity to donate, visit the GoFundMe page at: https://www.gofundme.com/billy-anthony-memorial-fund.

For more information about Texas State Technical College, visit tstc.edu.