Phonathon Phenomenon

Sweet Phonathon T-shirt
"Hi, my name is Sharon and I'm a freshman at Luther College. How are you tonight?" That was the line I recited over and over again Sunday night as about 15 other students and myself volunteered our evenings for the Luther Annual Phon-a-thon! The goal of the phon-a-thon is to get donations from Luther alumni to keep Luther College up and running for the next year. My bible study group signed up to participate as a team, so I decided I might as well give it a try. Seriously, how bad can talking on the phone be?


As I sat in the training session beforehand, I wondered what I had gotten myself into. First it occurred to me that this phon-a-thon must be pretty intense if a half hour training session is required! All of the instructions they were giving us were a little overwhelming: what buttons to push on the phone, (NOT 911 which has happened in the past because in order to call you have to push 9-1-and then the number), what shmoozing lines work best, and what information to get from the alumni. I began to wonder how much fun I was really going to have asking people for money during the next 3 hours.


I thought about all of the times at home where I had been the unfortunate family member to pick up the phone when a telemarketer called. Don't you love it when they call in the middle of dinner? Those phone calls usually didn't last long, although sometimes I was courteous enough to say "No Thanks" before hanging up. I wondered how many times I would get that same delightful response as I recited my scripted lines to the alumni.


As I entered my cubicle and saw the stack of papers telling me the alumni I got to call, I started getting nervous. What exactly was I going to say and how many people would actually donate? Much like the beginning of a cross country race, I just had to jump in and get rolling. No use in thinking it over too much and psyching myself out. Luckily for me, I got an answering machine on my first try (and on 20% of my calls the whole night), so at least the nervousness of dialing subsided. Whew! The first lady I actually reached, though, was very nice and right off the bat said she would give $200! SUCCESS!

To make the evening more fun, small prizes were given away throughout the calling process for contests such as "whoever gets the next $100 dollar pledge" or "whoever gets the next pledge from WI". We also were given Phon-a-thon bingo cards with spaces such as "Donation from someone with my same name" or "Pledge from someone living in a state along an ocean". There was even a board for us to write any funny quotes that people said. My favorite was a conversation that happened in the calling room:

Boy 1-I got an answering machine speaking in Spanish.
Boy 2-Then you should leave a message in Spanish.
Boy 1-"Quiero su dinero" sound good?


At the end of the night we made over $13,000 which was over our goal. The night actually turned out to be pretty fun, cheering on people who got big donations, getting free snacks and a t-shirt, and winning prizes. It helped me realize how many people across the nation are somehow tied to Luther College. These alumni have a lot of pride in Luther and clearly had a good experience while they were here. This gives me confidence that my four years here will prepare me for the future while leaving me with lasting relationships and memories. I agree with the alumni: I am glad to be a part of Luther College, and for me, this is just the beginning.