“Shake It Up” Star Zendaya and Champions of Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals Lead Magic Kingdom Parade

Zendaya, star of Disney Channel’s “Shake It Up,” rode down Main Street U.S.A., Thursday, in Magic Kingdom Park at the Walt Disney World Resort in Florida as Grand Marshal of the “Celebrate A Dream Come True” Parade. Zendaya was joined by three of 68 children known as the 2013 Champions of Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals.

Riding with Zendaya:

• Saray Gonzales, 13, from New Mexico is in remission after six rounds of chemotherapy and 30 days of radiation for Hodgkin’s lymphoma.

• Victoria Reed, 9, from Vermont, underwent ten surgeries and speech therapy for a cleft lip and palate, a defect that affects one in 600 children.

• Cody Trembecki, 11, from Calgary, Alberta, weighed just over a pound at birth and couldn’t breathe on his own. Cody endured five years with a tracheostomy and two surgeries to build a windpipe from cartilage and bone grafts.

The Children’s Miracle Network is a charity that raises funds and awareness for 170 pediatric centers. This week, the Champions and their families are meeting at Walt Disney World for CMN Hospitals’ 30th anniversary Celebration event, hosted by co-founders Marie Osmond and John Schneider. Sixty-eight children from the U.S. and Canada are spending a week in Florida and Washington DC, telling media, lawmakers and some of the largest North American companies how local donations changed their lives thanks to a children’s hospital.

The Walt Disney Company has been a partner with the Children’s Miracle Network for over 25 years, dating back to 1987, when the network’s telethon was broadcast from the Videopolis stage at Disneyland.