<rleton will be receiving eight automated external defibulators (AEDs) thanks to an alumni’s pledge that was followed by a direct donation from the college. After diligent and persistent lobbying by Ivan Duong ’14, an EMT certified pre-med student who noticed the campus’s blatant lack of the essential devices, the college will finally be able to acquire more of the devices to place in the more heavily frequented buildings.
“I didn’t expect this to happen so soon,” said Duong. “Now we’re finally going somewhere with this problem.”
Dan Rustad, a Development Director of the college who deals with the fiscal application of donations, received the word of the anonymous alumni’s tentative pledge for $5,000 to go towards the purchase of four AEDs in November.
“It’s so great that the college received funding for this; it shows that alums pay attention to what goes on here [on campus]”, Rustad said. “It’s nice too, when something like this is directly supporting an important cause.”
In turn, when the college found out about the alum’s expressed concern and subsequent possible donation to directly boost AED quota, they found room within their budget to supply $5,000 for the purchase of four more AEDs. The money will be coming out of the Facilities budget.
“When I told the alum that the college planned to do this, he said, ‘How about four more?’ and finalized the donation,” explained Rustad. “Talk about response!”
Now, with a combined total of $10,000 to specifically buy eight AEDs, Duong can work with the college to secure effective placement of the devices around campus. Elisabeth Haase, the Manager of Environmental Health and Safety Compliance, will be leading this effort in conjunction with Duong.
“We need to consider our future actions, and how the college should proceed from here,” she said of the imminent planning. “But for now, I’m sure the Health and Safety committee will just be blown away by this news!”
“I expected this to be a four year deal, you know, doing the presentation over and over again until it stuck,” added Duong. “I didn’t expect this to happen so fast.”
Aside from the issue of where to place these new AEDs, which will be decided upon by the end of January, Duong foresees another problem to ameliorate.
“Awareness is still something we need to work on,” he said. “We have six AEDs on campus already, but no one knows where they are.
“Also, we need to let people know that an AED isn’t a scary device: you literally press a button and it tells you how to work the machine,” he explained. “Educating the school [about AED function] is the next step.”
