January 21, 2005
Purdue to announce total funds raised to help tsunami victims
WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. – Purdue University will announce how much was raised to aid victims of the tsunami during a noon ceremony on Jan. 31 in the Memorial Union's Room 118.
"These students have been relentless in their pursuit to pull this together," said Pablo Malavenda, student government adviser and associate dean of student activities and organizations in the Office of the Dean of Students. "The beginning of the semester is always a busy period, yet they managed to mobilize and organize so many diverse areas."
Bill Lapcheska, chairman of the board of directors for the Tippecanoe Chapter of the American Red Cross, will be on hand to accept the check and send it to the International Response Fund.
A coalition of student organizations, coordinated by Purdue Student Government with support from the Office of the Dean of Students, organized the campaign to consolidate and re-enforce collection efforts at Purdue. Groups participating include the Interfraternity Council, Panhellenic Association, Mortar Board, Residence Hall Council and Purdue Student Union Board.
Money was collected from all over campus, including at the Purdue-IU basketball game as well as from sites in fraternity and sorority houses, cooperative houses and residence halls. The campaign officially ended Jan. 21, but donations continue to be counted.
Representatives from the groups that participated will be at the ceremony. Among those representatives will be a member of a residence hall organization who is from India and whose family was directly affected by the tsunami.
The student, Kunal Mehta, is a senior management major and is treasurer of the Excalibur Club, a group of residents from Wiley Hall that raised $1,000 for the campaign. Mehta's family lives in southwestern India and supplies diesel engine parts to fishing cooperatives that were devastated by the tsunami.
"My family is safe, but our business is suffering because the fishing companies they serve can't pay them," Mehta said. "We are trying to determine how much machinery was damaged and figure out what needs to be done. That will take a lot of time.
"Recovery will be a long process, but we hope not an impossible one."
More than 220,000 have died since the Dec. 26 tsunami, which was triggered by a magnitude 9.0 earthquake off the Indonesian island of Sumatra in the Indian Ocean. All infrastructure has been wiped out in areas hardest hit, including Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Thailand, Indonesia, India, Burma and Malaysia. Areas in Africa such as Kenya, Somalia and Tanzania also were damaged by the tsunami.
Writer: Maggie Morris, (765) 494-2432, maggiemorris@purdue.edu
Sources: Pablo Malavenda, (765) 494-1231, Pablo@purdue.edu
Kunal Mehta, (765) 495-5807, kmehta2@purdue.edu
Tim Jones, campaign coordinator, (765) 532-8331, tcjones@purdue.edu
Purdue News Service: (765) 494-2096; purduenews@purdue.edu
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