The 21st annual student telethon to raise money for the Alumni Fund begins this Sunday, and organizers are hoping to match last year's more than $500,000 in receipts.
The telethon, which will take place at the Top of the Hop Sunday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday nights, helps the College pay for general operating costs, according to Alumni Fund Intern Sam Keating '97, one of the telethon organizers.
For the first time organizers will allow donors to specify whether their donations will go towards current-use or financial aid.
"The Alumni Fund accounts for about 10 percent of operating costs," funding such programs as Foreign Study Programs and Language Study Abroad programs, Keating said.
Assistant Director of the Alumni Fund Christopher Buffoli said the telethon is very important to the College's finances.
Dartmouth student volunteers will telephone alumni who gave money to the College in previous years to ask for donations.
"Alums are generally fun to talk to," Keating said. "I called one person a few years ago and he said, 'How did you get my number?'" The alumnus had changed residences that day, and he said not even his mother had his new phone number.
"The alums that get called are usually pretty psyched on Dartmouth," Alumni Fund Intern Carolyn Abruzzo '97 said. "They ask lots of questions like 'How's the weather?'" Abruzzo said many alumni ask about specific professors they remember.
Keating said the alumni usually find many connections with the students such as common Greek organizations, hometowns, or sports. "It's not so much a chore as a conversation."
Abruzzo said many music groups will perform at the Top of the Hop during the telethon, including some of the College's a cappella groups.
This year's theme is "Vox Clamantis Dartmouth Calls," a line from a song Keating and Abruzzo found in the College archives, Abruzzo said.
The four student interns, Abruzzo, Keating, Christopher Laws '97 and Alexis White '97 worked with 40 members of the senior class to form a steering committee, which solicited prizes for volunteers and will manage the telethon, keeping track of donations.
In addition to individual prizes like ski passes, T-Shirts, a Nintendo 64 game system and airline tickets, Keating said group prizes such as discounts on disc jockeys are often popular with fraternities and sororities.
Although the telethon raised over $517,000 in pledges in 1994, the 1995 telethon fell short of its $500,000 goal by raising only $426,000 in pledges.
