Dance Marathon at the University of Florida Receives 2024 Campaign Activation Award

Miracle Network Dance Marathon recognized top performing Dance Marathon programs at Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals’ Ignite: Peer-to-Peer Leadership Conference held in Kansas City, MO from July 18-21.  

Congratulations to the winner of the 2024 Campaign Activation Award, Dance Marathon at the University of Florida! This year, DM at UF chose a yearlong campaign to re-center the organization around UF Health Shands Children Hospital. The campaign, #FightForMore, reflects on the past 30 years of DM at UF while propelling them into the next 30. With the goal of making sure the campaign could be used by anyone in the organization, they created a campaign that an action word could be added to the end of. This way they could ask people, what they #FightForMore of, whether that be more graduations, holidays, memories, etc. People being able to add an action word, helped them connect why they chose to be a part of DM at UF and helped foster a deeper connection to our cause. 

You can view the campaign release video on YouTube below: 

To reach new audiences with the #FightForMore campaign they used it at the center of all segmented communication, merchandise, events, and more. A key example of this integration was through their February campaign – each week of the month had a different theme of #FightForMore____. The 4 weeks were #FightForMoreSmiles, #FightForMoreCare, #FightForMoreFutures, and then finished up with a new push day #FightFor100k. They used each # to educate all member groups of where the funds they are raising directly go, so they could then understand why we were fighting. On their first ever #FightFor100k day, they gave all members Facebook profile pictures that stated #FightFor__ with their Champion Child pair. This way everyone, whether in or out of DM, knew who they were fighting for.

Through integration of the campaign into communication, events, merchandise and social media content, DM at UF inspired participants to #FightForMore throughout their entire year reaching new audiences while simultaneously connecting participants and supporters back to the cause! 

Congratulations, Dance Marathon at the University of Florida!

Miracle Network Dance Marathon is a national movement, involving over 400 colleges, universities and K-12 schools across the United States that fundraise for their local member hospital of Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals. Students involved in a campus’s dance marathon organization spend a year gaining leadership, teamwork, and nonprofit business experience while raising funds and awareness for their local Children’s Miracle Network Hospital. The year culminates with a final dance marathon event on each campus, where students get to meet patient families treated at their local hospital, participate in games and dancing, enjoy entertainment, and reveal their annual fundraising total. Miracle Network Dance Marathon programs have collectively raised more than $350 million since 1991.