IUDM clicks its way to $20,000

IU students who have Internet access and about 30 seconds to spare can help raise $20,000 for IU Dance Marathon in the next few weeks. \nIUDM, which hosts an annual 36-hour dance marathon event to raise money for Riley Hospital for Children, has raised more than $3 million since its formation in 1991. The group also does fundraising throughout the year, and is one of many organizations competing in Dodge’s “GrabLife GiveLife,” an online competition for philanthropic events. The first group to receive 20,000 student votes will get a $20,000 check from Dodge to go toward the charity of their choice. After a quick registration process on grablifegivelife.com , students can log in and click to vote for IUDM’s cause once per day. \n“This is a really great opportunity and we definitely feel like we can win this,” said senior Erin Dykhuizen, who is on the IUDM fundraising committee. “We are pushing this hard across campus because we feel we can get to 20,000 really fast with a campus this size.”\nIUDM has been in second place behind Babson College’s Lwala Project in the past week, but only by a few hundred votes. As of press time, IUDM had 6,146 votes.\n“Our progress was definitely hindered when kids went away for spring break last week and weren’t near a computer, but now that people are back I think the voting will pick up and we can win this,” said junior Greg Schultz, a member of IUDM’s fundraising committee. \nThe school in first place is currently on spring break so now is an opportune time for IUDM to take the lead, he said. \nTo be eligible to participate in the online event, voters must have an e-mail address that ends in .edu. Only one vote per e-mail account is permitted per day. Anyone with a college e-mail address can vote for any event, so Dykhuizen encourages students to tell their friends at other schools to get online and support IU. \n“Another thing that’s great is that IU students actually can vote twice per day,” she said. “IU students here can sign up under both an indiana.edu and an iub.edu e-mail address, which can double the amount of votes that one person can contribute.” \nIn November 2006, IUDM raised more than $920,000 for Riley and is hoping to hit the million dollar mark this year. IUDM has been recognized state-wide and nationally for its efforts in philanthropy. \n“This event is great because you don’t even have to be involved in IUDM to make a difference,” Schultz said. “You get a great sense of satisfaction from helping people, and even if people don’t realize it, it’ll help more than they could imagine.”