The ONE Campaign, dedicated to fight global poverty and disease, initiated the ONE Campus Challenge on Sept. 29. The campus challenge is an attempt to get U.S. college campuses involved with the ONE Campaign, and MTSU has taken an active role.
The cause was announced by Bono and Chris Rock on a Saturday night by a MTV forum involved with youth activism, the news release stated. The MTV forum stated that the challenge was a call to a generation to take the lead and fight against poverty.
"The trip I took to Africa with my family was an incredible, yet depressing journey," said comedian Chris Rock. "We were on the world's most beautiful continent, only to face the somber fact that tens of thousands of children die each day from diseases easily prevented and treated in other countries… Its time to get off of our couches, put down the video games, stop sitting around, and do something more to help. That's what ONE is all about."
The total points MTSU has accumulated as of Oct. 23 that the campus has earned is 1,740. The national position is 260. Points are earned through invites and sign ups as well as actions benefiting the campaign like letters to congress. Other campuses and information on how to join the challenge are found at the ONE Campus Challenge Web site www.one.org/campus/.
One of the Campus Challenge's methods to reach its goals is the Internet. Kimberly Cadena, the ONE Campaign's spokesperson said, "the goal of the ONE Campus Challenge is to recruit 100,000 new ONE members on 1,000 college campuses nationwide and create widespread awareness of global disease and extreme poverty. Already, ONE has over 115,000 'friends' on MySpace and more then 62,000 contacts for the ONE cause on Facebook." Student groups are also encouraged to hold regular meetings and participate in activities on campus.
ONE will track each school's progress, rewarding them for their accomplishments as the campaign progresses, the release stated. This method will curb the competition between the campuses and encourage participation to work as one. The campus with the most points overall will have the opportunity to host a performance on their campus. The grand prize is currently a secret, but there will be weekly challenges for the campus to reach certain milestones.
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