(ABC 6 News) – Students and staff at Mayo High School in Rochester who participated in the annual polar plunge today got a lucky break with the mild weather.

With outdoor temps in the mid-sixties (and the water at a tepid 45 degrees), plenty of students, staff and others willingly took turns going for a dip.

“I’m excited, I’m not really nervous,” said Mayo High School junior Hope Thomas, “This is my, like, third year doing it. This is a perfect day out, and it’s so great, because it’s cold but not really cold.”

Nearly two hundred students and staff made the plunge today, raising nearly $11,000 from participants supporting unified programming and Special Olympics for students in southeastern Minnesota.

“Lots of times, our students with special needs don’t get the loud claps at the football game or the roar of the crowd at the hockey game,” said Mayo High School unified coordinator Colin Thomas, before taking the plunge with Hope, his daughter. “But for right now, in just a couple minutes, they’re gonna hear the roar of the crowd and they know it’s for them.”

Olmsted County Sheriff Kevin Torgerson, who plunged on Wednesday for the 175th time in his career, said that over $5.8 million was raised last year from the mobile plunge program in Minnesota.