VOLthon at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville Receives 2024 Peer-to-Peer Fundraising 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 VOLthon at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville for their recognition as the 2024 winners of the Peer-to-Peer fundraising award! Utilizing the Dance Marathon Sprint Model to make intentional shifts to their recruitment and fundraising timing, VOLthon achieved a record-breaking fundraising total of $193,817.43 – a 21% increase year-over-year.
The first major change VOLthon made to their program in 2023-2024 was to refocus Child Health Day as an internal fundraising push. With a goal to raise $10,000 on Child Health Day, they provided their internal team with a friendly competition as well as graphic and communication templates to kickstart their fundraising for the year. With a focus on fundraising for the day – they shattered their goal raising $15,872.15 and increasing their fundraising on CHD by 136% year-over-year. They then turned their attention to participant recruitment and did not ask their internal team to personally fundraise again until their Day of Miracles push day three weeks before the event. This approach decreased burn-out, improved morale and took some of the stress of fundraising so internal team members could focus on the responsibilities of their role.
Following a successful recruitment sprint, they launched back into fundraising three weeks before the event focusing on high-value actions leading up to their Day of Miracles push day. Once again, they saw tremendous success by creating excitement and urgency around fundraising – raising a record total for the push day with 42% of the total raised by external participants. To achieve this fundraising success, they ensured they took time to educate participants prior to push, highlight programming opportunities they could get involved in and provided them with plenty of resources. To bring an element of cause connection into the push they brought the Lifeline Ambulance, that VOLthon helped purchase in 2023, to campus and participants were able to tour the ambulance gaining a further understanding of how funds raised were directly making an impact.
When it came time for the event experience, they created an intentional balance between fundraising and entertainment, resulting in over $61,000 raised in-event! This fundraising programming included a competition against another DM program, cause connected asks, matching hours, incentives and visits from popular student-athletes.
Congratulations to VOLthon at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville on your outstanding fundraising success in the 2023-2024 school year!
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.