Catherine Pollock knows more about organ donation than most people.
She sits and sweeps back her blonde hair from her forehead with a pair of black sunglasses, green eyes wide and intense, as she numbers off statistics about organ donation, such as the fact that the donated organs from a single person can benefit the lives of over 50 people.
Pollock should know her stuff. Since the spring of last year, she has been working on a project to make information about organ donation more accessible to college students. A 1999 economics graduate of the University, she is now the executive director of the College Campaign for Organ Donation (CCOD) in Charlottesville, an organization she started just a few months ago.
"I have a lot of confidence that this thing is going to be a major organization some day," Pollock said. It was her father's liver transplant that first prompted Pollock's interest in organ donation and the creation of the CCOD. After being hospitalized in February 1998 for acute liver failure, her father remained on the waiting list for a liver until August of that year. He eventually got his transplant, but it was the long, painful wait that settled into Pollock's memory.
"Our dad is the heart of my family. Some people say that an organ only lasts for about five years after a transplant, but at least this would give him more time to be there. He could do things like see me graduate from college," she said.
The memory of her father's wait on the organ donor list sparked an interesting idea during her fourth year. While Pollock weighed her future against the backdrop of her interest in working for a non-profit organization, she put off medical school and decided that the many consulting firms she interviewed with just weren't her cup of tea. Instead, she began to research the budding question forming in her mind: Why are college students among the smallest population of organ donors in the country?
To begin answering this question, Pollock paid a visit to James Childress, a religious studies professor at the University and a member of the President's National Bioethics Advisory Commission. She wanted to come up with a proposal that would help inform college age students about the importance of organ donation.
"I told him I had this really outlandish idea but wanted to know where to go with it. He listened to it and said it wasn't all that outlandish. Then he put me in touch with UNOS," Pollock said.
The United Network of Organ Sharing (UNOS) is the governing body of organ donation in the U.S. It matches and adds those in need of organs to the long regional and national waiting lists 24 hours a day.
Pollock pitched her idea to executive director David Fleming of the Coalition on Donation - the public relations arm of UNOS.
"I really wanted them to hire me to actually carry out my idea. But they just didn't have the funds," Pollock said.
Ever since that interview with Fleming, Pollock has been working on building a grassroots campaign to start her own non-profit organization - thus the birth of the CCOD.
Although the CCOD's recognition as a non-profit organization is still pending, Pollock is already working on several long-term goals, such as reaching a $600,000 budget. She also wants the CCOD to function as a national organization with several regional chapters at colleges and universities across the country. Schools such as the University of Pennsylvania, Rice University and Duke University have already begun working collaboratively on the project.
Even though Pollock is not being paid for her efforts, she treats it like a 40-hour-a-week job.
"I work on this from 9 to 5 during the week, and then I work as a bartender on the weekends to pay the bills. I'm usually all over town in meetings during the week," she explained.
Using a group of volunteer University students as interns, Pollock hopes to spread the word as to why organ donation is important for college students.
"It's not a subject most people our age talk about. There's a lot of stigma surrounding it," she said.
Pollock shifts in her seat and recrosses her legs. She explains how very few young people want to discuss death, and neither do their parents.
"People just don't want to talk about death. But the truth is, people can save a life so easily just by talking to family members about this," she said.
Pollock says that religion and minority status can play heavily in the decision to donate organs.
"For a lot of minorities, there is this myth that doctors won't work as hard to save you if you're a minority," Pollock said.
For Pollock, the key to opening people's minds to organ donation is knowledge and communication. With these tools, she believes the CCOD can drastically increase the number of college-age organ donors.
The other major obstacle to organ donation is religion. Although Pollock says that all major religions are accepting of organ donation, this ideal does not always hold true.
"When I was younger, my babysitter needed an organ transplant. But she was a member of the Jewish community and they were not accepting of transplants. She just got sicker and sicker and eventually had a stroke. She never got a transplant," said Lucas Kline, second-year College student and social chair of Phi Sigma Kappa fraternity.
Kline believes that the CCOD needs all the help it can get to increase awareness and erase such negative connotations surrounding transplants. For this reason, Phi Sigma, in collaboration with Kappa Delta and Alpha Chi Omega sororities will be throwing a Halloween Bash 2000 as a fundraising event tonight from 8 p.m. to midnight at the Phi Sigma fraternity house.
"This issue is way under the table. They get very little publicity, but deserve a lot more," Kline said.
Another reason Pollock sees the CCOD as an organization with a lot of potential is that, for many students, organ donation is an issue that strikes close to home.
Second-year College student Kate Ferrill is coordinating the Bash and also serves as an intern for Pollock.
"There wasn't a place for me to volunteer, a place where I felt I could make a difference until I began as an intern. My 10-year old cousin needed a kidney transplant a few years ago, so it was already a personal issue for me," Ferrill said.
Ferrill has been working for the past few months to make the Halloween Bash a reality. She says that tonight's party will be open to all University students with a valid student I.D. The CCOD will be asking a minimum donation of $5 per person to help reach a goal of $5000.
Although the past several months have been filled with long hours, financial hardships and a lot of paperwork to get the CCOD off the ground, Pollock does not regret a minute of it.
"Anyone can do what I did. But you've really got to be committed to pushing the envelope. I really think that this can make a significant impact and affect people pretty profoundly," Pollock said.
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