Mother's Day card sale to benefit Middle Way House

Busy college students often overlook Mother’s Day. A group of students are hoping to make sure people don’t forget it and are raising money for Bloomington’s Middle Way House in the process.\nThe group of five students is selling Mother’s Day cards to benefit the Middle Way House Rape Crisis Center as part of a group project for the IU course Principles of Public Relations. \nToby Strout, executive director of Middle Way House, said the rape crisis center is open 24 hours a day. The center receives a call any time a rape is committed, and someone from the center goes out to assist and stay with the rape victim.\n“It’s a nice thing to have someone there at 3 o’clock in the morning,” Strout said. “Or anytime for that matter.”\nMiddle Way House’s mission, according to the Middle Way House Web site, is: “To end violence, both structural and interpersonal, in the lives of women and children.” It has programs that can help abused women find housing and support.\nThe group of public relations students met with staff at Middle Way House and found something it could do in addition to promoting the Middle Way House, said group member and IU junior Amanda Gilles. The Middle Way House suggested the group sell Mother’s Day cards on campus.\nJunior Cayla McLeland said it was difficult to find an organization and come up with ideas. But, she added, the cause was worthwhile.\n“It’s a good feeling to know that you’re helping a good cause,” she said.\nGroup member junior Andrea Weintraub said a lot of people don’t even know what Middle Way House is. \nIn addition to raising money for the organization, “it’s good to get the word out,” she said.\nGroup members are selling the cards for $10 in their classes, some stores in the Union, Howard’s Bookstore and the UPS store on College Mall Road. Gilles said the group also plans to sell bookmark inserts for $5, but they haven’t come in yet. The group also created a Facebook page about the sale.\nStrout said Middle Way House has sold Mother’s Day cards to benefit the rape crisis center before, but never on IU’s campus. Strout said that in 1989, Middle Way House got 10,000 signatures from students and did all the paperwork so students could check off that they wanted to give money to the Rape Crisis Fund at registration.\nThe rape crisis center used to receive 100 percent of the profits from the students’ donations, Strout said. Recently, however, the funding from the registration was cut to 25 percent of the money, the rest going to other organizations. With the decrease in funding, Middle Way House needed to find other ways to raise enough money to support the Rape Crisis Center.\nStrout said a lot of students are concerned about the work Middle Way House does and several groups have done projects to benefit the Middle Way House.\n Besides the awareness and financial support the sale will bring Middle Way House, Strout said she hopes it will help students remember their mothers at a hectic time of year.\n“I can see Mother’s Day getting lost in there,” she said.