Prematurity Awareness Month is happening now! Look out for the purple buildings!

I am continuing to love my internship at March of Dimes.  Right now I am in my waiting period; in two weeks things will start to pick up again.  It is slow because I spent the past month continuing a project the summer intern began.  The month of November is Prematurity Awareness Month and November 17 is Prematurity Awareness Day.  The goal is to reduce preterm births and raise awareness about what a problem preterm births are.  The goal I was concentrating on accomplishing was to raise awareness about pre-term births.

During the summer, the other intern called businesses around the Philadelphia area asking them to light up their building in purple for Prematurity Awareness Month, very similar to buildings lighting up pink for Breast Cancer Awareness Month in October.  She secured five buildings and two bridges.  Four of those buildings are in the Philadelphia metropolitan area, one is on City Avenue, and then the two bridges are the Ben Franklin Bridge that runs over the Delaware River and the Strawberry Mansion Bridge that runs over the Schuylkill River.  It was my job to call the businesses closer to November to confirm they would still be lighting up their building on the dates that were discussed in July.

I also sent out my first press release!!  The press release was to inform the residents of Philadelphia why the buildings were lit up in purple.  I researched the local media and where to send press releases and mailed, emailed, and faxed them out.

Right now it is the waiting period because the next step is to send out a thank you follow-up letter and that can’t be sent out until after the buildings get lit up so I am currently helping out other employees in the office.

I am really enjoying my internship and feel extremely accomplished with what I’ve done so far.  Everyone look out for the purple buildings that will be lit up throughout this month and remember it is Prematurity Awareness Month from the March of Dimes!