The University of Wisconsin-Platteville’s fall blood drive collected over 900 units of blood from 230 students, staff and faculty during homecoming week.

UW-Platteville has hosted the Red Cross event every semester for 34 years.  This year, the blood drive was sponsored by the Residence Hall Association and the National Residence Hall Honorary.

Josh Huber, RHA president and a senior majoring in civil engineering, was pleased with the outcome of the three-day blood drive.

“It’s a great achievement for the university to have that many people donate,” Huber said.

Kaela Mellen, a senior psychology major, donates blood often for personal reasons.

“My aunt is a recent cancer survivor and she used to give blood on a regular basis,” Mellen said.  “Now, she can no longer give blood like she used to, so I give blood for her and every other person out there who can’t but would like to.”

Huber said this year there were eight machines taking double blood donation. There were 42 people the first day, 43 the second day and 44 double blood donations given on the final day of the drive.

“We planned for 280 single units to be given per day but ended up receiving around 300 units each day,” Huber said.
Huber said he thought the number of donations went up this year because of the new students on campus.

“We are thankful for the Red Cross, CPR and the volunteers and donors who came to the blood drive,” Huber said.  “We hope that next year the previous donors will return to donate again.”

For more information about the blood drive, contact Huber at [email protected] or visit the RHA webpage at http://www.uwplatt.edu/org/rha/blood_drive.html.