Penn State BMES Student Chapter Joins THON

THON total for 2014 display.
Photo by: Annemarie Mountz

Most students and organizations at Penn State are involved in the Dance Marathon raising money in the fight against pediatric cancer. However despite THON’s long history, the Penn State Biomedical Engineering Society student chapter wasn’t involved in the effort until last year. The pilot year of BMES THON was a struggle. We weren’t able to participate in two of the canning weekends because of low club involvement and our alternative fundraiser didn’t run as smoothly as we had hoped. Overall during the year we raised $2,200 for the kids and left three highly motivated founding THON members who wanted BMES THON to grow.

The three founding members started a THON Committee and planned on attending all three canning weekends. Luckily thanks to the involvement of several determined students, the first canning weekend was a success. We raised over $2,000 in the first weekend of fundraising alone, the same amount we raised all of last year. Other THON committee members made two more successful canning trips including. After the fall season of fundraising, the BMES THON Committee had met its goal of reaching the minimum fundraising total to establish dancers for the organization. However, we didn’t stop there, and continued our fundraising efforts using THONvelopes, online fundraising and corporate matching programs. In the end, BMES raised a total of $5,600 for THON 2014.

We hope BMES THON continues this forward momentum and support for THON continues to grow within the club. We have plans of adopting a family to support them emotionally and expanding our fundraising endeavors in the future. Even though we are a small organization, we are proud of our steps in fighting pediatric cancer.

- Olivia Hoylman, biomedical engineering undergraduate student