Greetings from Vanderbilt University Swim Club!  My name is David Walker, and though our club is fairly young/new I greatly appreciate all of the help that many of you have given me in the past couple of months.  This whole alliance with other teams is both new and exciting for our entire team.  Yet being that is is just that, an alliance, I see this as a great opportunity to let you know about one opportunity our swim team has created, and plans on taking full advantage of.
                    Over the past month and a half,  the news has bombarded us with a slew of stories concerning the tsunami in Sri Lanka.  With those stories, however, come the overwhelming urge, among all campuses, to help in some way.    It has always been my thought that it is very possible to engage in some act of service without deviating from your daily routine.  So, without further adieu, here is my plan.  A simple "swim-a-thon" with proceeds benefiting UNICEFand the tsunami relief fund.  For those of you who aren't familiar with a "swim-a-thon" it is basically a fund raising tool used by swim clubs.  Swimmers collect donations either in a flat monetary amount, or a pledged amount of perhaps "5 cents for every lap swam".  After the collecting is done, swimmers hop in the pool and swim for either 30 min. or 1hr. If your a person who doesn't want to go around campus asking for donations, there could simply be a flat buy in to participate.  

Of course it is both, impractical and unnecessary for all participating schools to run fund raisers in the same place, or even at the same time.  Thus you could run your own individual fund raiser, collect money, and then deposit it within an account on the UNICEF website.  Of course we would want to have all fund raisers completed by the end of the school year, the time at which yours would be run could be completely up to you. 

So thats the plan, and I hope some of you will join me in our teams efforts.  E-mail me back with your thoughts/ concerns.  I am not asking much of you, just to go about doing something we all love to do: swim.  I don't plan to make bundles of money, but simple acts such as these are contagious especially within confined campus; perhaps our program could spark others to do the same.  It is not often that we can use the things we love in life to benefit other people.  Thus, I really hope you guys consider this, and if all goes well we can have our fund raisers are set to go in about a month.  Thanks for taking the time to read this, I really do appreciate it.  Peace,

David Walker

Vanderbilt Swim Club