An almost completely student-funded service organization has been helping to serve the Milwaukee community since 1988.
Midnight Run, a volunteer service program which runs out of Campus Ministry, is currently looking to Marquette residence halls, sororities and fraternities to fund a day at the Noon Run, Marquette’s very own meal site located on 19th Street and Wisconsin Avenue, where they serve soup, sandwiches, dessert and drinks to local homeless people.
Pay-a-Day is one of the many fundraisers that Midnight Run has to help fund the kitchen. It happens once a semester, and usually takes place for two weeks, said Jennifer Mays, the fundraising co-coordinator for Midnight Run.
Student volunteers involved in Midnight Run work at local meal programs and shelters to serve meals and build relationships with the communities hungry and homeless.
Mays, a senior in the College of Business Administration, said that they began contacting residence halls and Greek organizations after Spring Break to see if they would be interested in sponsoring Noon Run for a day.
She said any dorm floor in a residence hall or sorority that sponsors a day is welcome to come to the site and see how it works.
Gerry Fischer, assistant director of Campus Ministry, said that Pay-a-Day is the newest form of fundraising that Midnight Run has come up with, but it is not the only fundraising they do.
“It costs about $6,000 to fund Noon Run for the year,” he said.
That $6,000 breaks down into $40 a day for 150 days. Noon Run serves the public Sunday through Thursday whenever school is in session.
“Pay-a-Day works to get support from different people and groups on campus,” Fischer said. “It is not a huge investment, but it does help to alleviate some of the stress for students doing the fundraising.”
Along with Pay-a-Day, he said Midnight Run gets a majority of its funding from their Mile for Meals Run/Walk, which is held annually over Family Weekend.
“We reach a little under half our $6,000 budget every year (at the Run/Walk),” he said.
Pay-a-Day works along with other fundraisers they have like Meals at Midnight, which sells hot dogs and nachos at the corner of 16th and Wells Street from Midnight to 3 a.m. Fischer also send they receive donations from alumni and faculty which really help out.
Jamie Burns, a junior in the College of Health Sciences who is a volunteer for Noon Run, said it is important to continue fundraising for the organization because Noon Run is important part of establishing a community bond with the underserved people of Milwaukee and create lasting relationships.
“They expect us to be there every day, to give them food, hospitality and friendship,” she said. “They depend on us.”
Burns said volunteering with Noon Run has been one of the most rewarding experiences she has had at Marquette.
“It has given me a new definition of what homelessness is and what being poor is,” she said. “It has helped me to view different people that I do not know in a new light.”