Students must volunteer 10 hours for ticket
A new community outreach program run by UW-Madison students would give anyone logging 10 or more hours of community service by next spring a free concert ticket.
The project, The 10,000 Hours Show, is an expansion of a University of Iowa program by the same name. The idea was brought to UW-Madison by sophomore and organization Co-Director Katheryn Resop, after attending a conference in Iowa.
I thought it was like the most amazing idea I'd ever heard,\ Resop said. ""So I came back to campus and contacted the 10,000 Hours Show and I've been talking to the national director ever since. ... In January, I brought the idea, I launched it here on campus and started recruiting students to help me out with it.""
Although Resop would not state for certain which band would be playing at the proposed concert, tentatively scheduled for the third week in April 2007, she did hint at bands being considered.
""We've been throwing around a lot of names, stuff like the style of Jack Johnson, Guster maybe, Ben Folds, that kind of stuff,"" she said.
According to Ann Dingman, advisor for the program, those who are interested in having their community work counted toward the 10-hour requirement next year will be able to register at www.volunteeryourtime.org. Use of this site, according to Dingman, allows those who wish to serve the community to have a variety of options.
""Basically it'll be pretty much any local non-profit [organization] that serves the Madison community will be a site people can get hours,"" Dingman said.
However, putting together such an event is quite an undertaking.
""Obviously one of the biggest difficulties is financial,"" Co-Chair Emily Stern said. ""We have to raise $60,000 and right now we have nothing. And the hardest part about raising money is getting it started. People don't want to give money unless someone else already has.""
Aside from the difficulty of raising money to hire a band, Resop cited both registering the organization as non-profit and recruitment as other major obstacles. However, despite these worries Resop remains confident in the program's success at UW-Madison.
""I am extremely optimistic about it,"" Resop said. ""There are definitely times when I feel overwhelmed, but our staff is just so amazing and we've made a promise to each other that this is going to happen. We're going to make it happen.""
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