Pacific Lutheran University

Throughout the year PLU’s Progress Club has made the extra effort to bring awareness to the realities of the U.S. Health Care system and raise money for the free care fund at Mary Bridge Children’s Hospital in Tacoma.

At the end of May members of the club were finally able to hand over their gift to Mary Bridge representatives – nearly $10,000.

The following is an e-mail exchange between Progress Club President Harold Leraas and Eric Quist from Mary Bridge. It outlines how an idea can make a difference.

-----Original Message----- From: Harold Leraas Sent: Wednesday, May 06, 2009 9:47 AM To: Eric Quist Subject: Donation

Hello Eric,

My name is Harold Leraas and I represent a club at Pacific Lutheran University called "Progress". Over the past year my club has been conducting fundraisers to donate to the free care fund at Mary Bridge. We've had spotty contact with on site staff, but we are currently in a position to donate our funds and were wondering how to go about this. We have raised over 5,000 dollars (that is a very conservative estimate) and are very excited to send our money over so that it can be utilized, especially after hearing about recent budget cuts. How should we go about getting our money to you?

Thanks for your time,

Harold Leraas PLU Progress Club President

On May 6, 2009, at 10:17 AM, Eric Quist wrote:

Hi Harold,

Thank you for your e-mail and for your very generous contribution. We deeply appreciate your help.

One of my colleagues, Ryan Egge, and I would be glad to come to meet you at PLU or, if you prefer, you may come up here to Mary Bridge Children's Hospital. If you came here, we could give you a tour of Mary Bridge so that you could see how your gift will be used.

We will be glad to do whatever you wish.

Please thank the other club members for us.

Best wishes,

Eric

-----Original Message-----

From: Harold Leraas Sent: Wednesday, May 06, 2009 10:29 AM To: Eric Quist Subject: Re: Donation

Hey Eric,

Thanks for the prompt reply! I think that a tour would be great, and I'm sure that our members would love to see the facility and speak to anyone on your end who has any information about health care. Our club goals are to raise money for children who cannot afford medical care in Tacoma and to educate our community about the realities of the US healthcare system, so I'm sure anything we can learn at Mary Bridge would be very much appreciated.

Harold

On May 6, 2009, at 10:41 AM, Eric Quist wrote:

Harold,

Great! I will check dates with Ryan and as soon as we can get one set up, we can arrange a tour. Tours of Mary Bridge typically include the Emergency Department, a medical-surgical floor, and the pediatric intensive care unit.

The gift from your club is greatly appreciated. The parents of about 40% of the children who come to Mary Bridge cannot afford to pay some or all of their children's medical expenses. This is where gifts like yours make all the difference in the world.

Eric

-----Original Message-----

From: Harold Leraas Sent: Wednesday, May 06, 2009 4:30 PM To: Eric Quist Subject: Re: Donation

Hey Eric,

We have a total of how much we have raised, it is $9,267.27. Let me know when you are ready for us to come visit.

Harold

On May 6, 2009, at 4:58 PM, Eric Quist wrote:

Wow! That's really impressive! Thanks so much.

Ryan and I would be happy to take you and your group on a tour of Mary Bridge. How many in your group? We may have to set up more than one tour and possibly even one on another day.

Let me know if none of these dates and times work and we can look at our calendars again.

BTW, the tour should take a little over an hour, so we wouldn't necessarily need the entire two hour period.

I am curious about your club. What can you tell me about it and its members? It sounded like your group had a special interest in health care.

Thanks again, Harold, for your e-mails and your and your club's interest in children's health care. Ryan and I look forward to meeting with you and the other members.

Best wishes,

Eric

-----Original Message-----

From: Harold Leraas Sent: Thursday, May 07, 2009 2:10 PM To: Eric Quist Subject: Re: Donation

So the idea for the club was one that I came up with in High School. When I got to PLU I floated by a few friends in passing who really liked it, and we got the ball rolling from there. We founded the organization last spring and had some spotty contact with someone else at Mary Bridge, I think she was in a completely different department, but we've been holding onto the cash to donate.

We basically set up our organization on the idea that college kids don't have that much money and hate parting with it. So we tried to come up with fundraising ideas that would engage people in donating as well as make them think a little bit about what they were donating to. Basically we look for a lot of attention and audience involvement. Our two most successful fundraisers are named "Sign Me Drive" and "Save it or Shave it". The sign me drive consists of a full day where volunteers run around in their bathing suits soliciting one dollar donations for people to write on their bodies with sharpies, ten dollar donations for people to write on their faces. Save it or Shave it is a week long event, during which participants carry two cans around all week soliciting donations, one reading "save it" the other "shave it", the can with the most money at the end of the week determines the fate of their hair. Both fundraisers raised over 1200 dollars. We have done the sign me drive twice, it brought in 1550 the first time and 2340 the second time.

We have also done some other scattered fundraisers, they generally bring in about 1000, but the ones that people really enjoyed have stayed on our list for repeats.

As far as the health care education piece goes, we have held several events on campus to discuss US health care. Last year we held a panel discussion with University professors that examined the health care proposals of Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and John McCain. We had about 100 people show up to that. This year we screened "Sicko" by Michael Moore which had about 50 attendees. These are very good numbers for our university as we only have about 3500 students, with less than 2000 on campus.

Next week we are going to be soliciting signatures to be sent to our Washington state representatives as well as congressmen and senators to discuss our beliefs and wishes for health care. We will also be soliciting donations then, but do not expect a whole lot because of the difference in nature from our normal fundraisers.

Our membership was predicted to be mainly pre-medical students, but it turned out to entice the whole spectrum. It’s become a bit of a social phenomenon, I think mainly because of the nature of the events that we do. A lot of the real "movers and shakers" on campus end up taking part in our fundraisers, so there is a lot of enthusiasm on campus.

Back to the visit though, I talked it over with the group and we all though that Friday the 22 sounds best. We should be about 10 people give or take one or two. Everyone sounds very excited about the tour.

Thanks for all of your help Eric,

Harold

From: Eric Quist Date: May 7, 2009 3:56:35 PM PDT To: Harold Leraas Subject: RE: Donation

Good afternoon,

Harold, have you thought about a career in fundraising? It sounds like you are well on your way. And you and your group are very creative.

Thanks for all the background information. It was very interesting.

Ryan and I will meet you Friday, May 22, at 9:00 am in the hospital.

I will set up two tours beginning a little after 9:00 am. The first tour will go to the Emergency Department, Med-Surg, and the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit (PICU) in that order. The second group will go to the PICU, the Emergency Department, and Med-Surg in that order.

Thanks again for your generosity.

Eric