Blood drive breaks records

Every last drop of blood has been accounted for and the results of the Blood Drive Challenge, a competition among Monmouth and Ocean County high schools initiated by 95.9 WRAT-FM, are in.

By the end of the 2007 school year, the Monmouth and Ocean County high school juniors and seniors who had been donating their blood since mid-October as part of the Blood Drive Challenge raised donation levels by 22 percent over last year, according to the Central Jersey Blood Center, Red Bank, and the American Red Cross, Philadelphia Chapter. Officials at the blood centers said this is the biggest margin of increase in years.

"We were hoping this program would inspire the kids growing up today to think of the needs of others and become proactive," said Doug Sjonvall, marketing and promotions director for 95.9 WRAT.

To encourage school spirit and to entice the schools to hold more than one blood drive, WRAT obtained a 2006 yellow Nissan Sentra to give away to one lucky donor and Six Flags Great Adventure tickets for the school with the highest percentage of donations.

According to a press release, Danielle Jackson, 18, a senior at Keyport High School, won the Nissan Sentra donated by Sansone Route 66 Auto Mall, Neptune, in a random drawing of all the donors, including parents, alumni, faculty, and administration from each school.

Collier High School, of the Wickatunk section of Marlboro, won tickets to Six Flags Great Adventure, Jackson, for its entire junior and senior classes for having the highest percentage of donations at 73 percent, based on the size of the school and the number of students who donated blood.

The sponsors who underwrote the Blood Drive Challenge competition included the U.S. Army, Sansone Route 66 Auto Mall, Brookdale Community College, Ocean County College and Six Flags Great Adventure.

Kristy Kane, media and public relations manager for the American Red Cross, Penn-Jersey Region, said, "WRAT's Blood Drive Challenge is extremely meaningful because it made everyone aware of how easy it is to give blood and how important blood donations are. In order to meet just the basic needs of area patients, 2,000 units of blood must be collected each and every day in New Jersey and southeastern Pennsylvania. That means more than 220,000 people need to donate blood between the end of May and the middle of September. We'd like to thank WRAT for its efforts to help us."

Pat McTighe of the Central Jersey Blood Center said, "CJBC would like to thank all the high school students, chairpersons and administration for their support. We had an amazing turnout this year."

WRAT-FM is a Greater Media Inc. radio station. Greater Media is the parent company of 20 AM and FM radio stations in the Boston, Detroit, New Jersey and Philadelphia markets. It also owns a modern printing plant and a group of weekly newspapers in central New Jersey, as well as several telecommunications towers located throughout the United States.