Lock Haven University alumni show they are ‘All In’ during annual donation day

by Kerri Hoover Editor-in-Chief

The Lock Haven University Foundation (LHUF) celebrated its 9th annual All In Day of Giving on April 13 and 14. Alumni flocked together during the 24-hour period and fundraised over $130,000 for student academic and sports programs. All In is LHU’s largest fundraiser event of the year.

As of April 15, 699 individuals donated to the university. Donors had the option to fund between four LHU sections including academics, athletics, student retention, and the area of greatest need.

Haven Athletics received the most donations (493), totaling $88,377. Academics received the second-most (113) equaling $24,995.

By donating to the academic and athletic programs, supporters could then decide which specific major or sports team they wanted to support. Twenty-seven majors and 17 athletics teams were available to choose from.

According to the All In website, the student retention fund accepted donations to help provide supplemental aid to students struggling to complete their degree. However, if people had difficulty determining which program to support, they could donate to the area of greatest need fund. The student retention fund raised $3,440 while the area of greatest need fund raised $14,091.

Fifteen online matching challenges were also created and held during All In Day of Giving. Many of the challenges were achieved, including The Bob Lomison Greek Life Challenge. If 100 Greek alumni made a gift, 1971 alumnus Bob Lomison would donate $5,000 to support LHU Greek-life initiatives. Greek-life donors showed up in record numbers this year totaling 115 donors.

To further encourage donations among alumni, the LHUF advertised the fundraiser and its challenges on social media through frequent posts, videos and shareable links.

In addition to online donations, All In Day of Giving featured three on-campus challenges on April 13 for students to partake in. This was the first year that the LHUF hosted such events at The Haven.

John Vitale, the assistant director of alumni engagement and one of the coordinators for All In, wanted to establish several fun, participatory challenges to boost student involvement and awareness about the 24-hour fundraiser.