NW now has a Love Your Melon crew on campus. Love Your Melon is a non-orifut organization that operates nation wide, mianly through college campuses.
Tamra Weilenga, a member of NW’s Love Your Melon crew, shows off some of the Love Your Melon gear.
Recently there have been a few students asking, “What’s with the girls in the hats?” Whether they saw the group of girls in similar hats posing for pictures in the snow or were followed by the social media pages posting these pictures, the question remained the same. This fashion trend is in need of explanation.
On the Northwestern campus, a group of dedicated students has joined together to represent a company called Love Your Melon. Love Your Melon was founded by Zachary Quinn and Brian Keller as an assignment in their entrepreneurship class at the University of St. Thomas. Love Your Melon has now grown into a nationwide fight against childhood cancer.
The company started selling hats as a “buy one, give one” program. For every hat that is bought, a hat is donated to a child battling cancer. This non-profit company also donates half of its proceeds to the Pinky Swear Foundation and CureSearch, and the rest is used to benefit the lives of children struggling with cancer.
One might ask just how this explains the girls in the hats. To expand their outreach, Love Your Melon created ambassador crews on college campuses which allow students to be involved in an impactful service project.
The company is now supported and advocated for by more than 11,000 student ambassadors attending over 736 colleges nationwide, including the girls in the hats being spotted around NW’s campus. From advertising on campus and social media to dressing up as superheroes and visiting children in the hospital to deliver hats, these crews are the driving force behind Love Your Melon.
The Northwestern crew captain, Madison Dubbs, was the first to contact Love Your Melon with an interest of getting NW involved.
“After reading about the company and how campuses all over the country were really the ones in charge of it, I thought it would be cool to get a crew started here to spread the word and help the cause,” Dubbs said.
After initiating the NW campus crew, Dubbs recruited students willing to give their time to meet and create events to share with NW all that Love Your Melon has to offer. The crew is now made up of 20 students, both girls and guys, who are committed to doing their part in the fight against childhood cancer.
Junior Jenn Inge is the vice-captain of the crew. She joined the crew because she felt passionately about the Love Your Melon mission.
“I wanted to be a part of something bigger and know that something I was involved in was directly impacting the lives of young kids struggling with cancer,” Inge said.
Students also have an opportunity to join in the fight by supporting the NW campus crew and purchasing items from Love Your Melon. There are Instagram, Twitter,and Facebook pages which post notifications about any events held as well as announce new Love Your Melon product release dates.
Love Your Melon has a product release about once a month, during which items that are ready for purchase are posted on loveyourmelon.com.
If interested in purchasing any apparel, especially a spring cap, the next product release is Monday, April 4th at 6:00 p.m. CST. To support the NW campus crew when purchasing something, choose “Northwestern College (IA)” as the crew to credit in your cart.
Myles Anderson is another member of the NWC crew. He encourages all students to join the fight against cancer.“Just about everyone knows at least one person who has been affected by cancer. We all know its debilitating effects and the horrible life changes it causes,” Anderson said. “Why not join a group that helps improve the lives of those suffering?”
Join in the fight against childhood cancer by supporting Love Your Melon and the NW campus crew.
