The Campus Ambassador Program (CAP) officially kicked off with the first CAP Symposium held August 14-16 at the Boca Raton Marriott in Boca Raton, Fla. More than 100 college students from all 50 states, gathered to learn how they can personally combat blood cancer in America.
With a motto of ‘50 States, 1 Mission’, all campus ambassadors will fundraise and run a series of bone marrow drives on their campuses with the goal of swabbing thousands of students. This will result in a total of 100,000 new people added to the organization’s bone marrow registry during the 2015-16 school year.
The program, spearheaded by Gift of Life managers Alec Burkin and Nick Hudson, was developed to provide students nationwide with the knowledge, training and tools to become an agent of change on campus.
At the symposium ambassadors learned about the organization, cheek swabbing, the transplant process and how to promote campus drives. Keynote speakers included Gift of Life CEO Jay Feinberg, Gift of Life Medical Director Dr. Bruce Lenes, Associate Vice President and Technical Director of DNA Identification at LabCorp, Dr. Uwe Heine, and Doug Gribbin, the grandfather of a little girl from Florida who suffers from Fanconi anemia, and in desperate need of a bone marrow match.
In addition to meetings and break-out sessions, the ambassadors witnessed the first-time meeting between life-saving donor Tim Lupo and the 11-year old girl to whom he donated bone marrow. Lupo, a police officer from Wisconsin, joined the registry in 2012 at Ohio University, while in town visiting his now-wife, Elizabeth. Coincidentally, they celebrated their one-year wedding anniversary on Saturday.
“I decided to join the registry because it would provide a great, albeit unexpected, opportunity to help someone if I was ever called,” said Lupo. “When I got the call I couldn’t stop smiling for the rest of the day. I do not consider myself a hero; my recipient is the strong one, the one who has been fighting a difficult and courageous battle.”
The recipient was diagnosed in April 2011 with leukemia when she was seven years old. At that age, she knew that she had a very serious disease that caused painful and intense treatments. When her miracle match was finally found, she received her transplant at a hospital in Chicago.
“I am so very excited to meet my lifesaver and look forward to expressing my endless gratitude,” said the recipient. “I hope we will have a friendship. Being a donor is the most beautiful and kind human decision one can do."
Lupo’s kit was sponsored by the Boca West Foundation (BWF), which identifies and funds projects to assist children and their families in need in the Boca Raton and South Palm Beach County areas. To date, Gift of Life has received close to $40,000 from BWF to help process test kits for potential donors to join the worldwide bone marrow donor registry.
