Purple Pinkie Project stations around the region.
Volunteers were on hand to color the pinkies
of anyone willing to donate $1 toward Rotary
International’s “End Polio Now” campaign; $1 is
the estimated cost to immunize one child from
polio, so a purple pinkie serves as a symbol for
one polio immunization. Rotarians use a topical
purple dye to mark the pinkies of those who
have been immunized when they conduct polio
immunization days to prevent double dosages.
Purple Pinkie Stations were held at the Fort
Fairfield Rotary Club’s 2014 Cash Draw event,
at the Presque Isle and Caribou Rotary Clubs’
respective weekly Noontime meetings, at Presque
Isle High School, Presque Isle Middle School,
MMG Insurance, UMPI, NMCC, TAMC, UMPI’s
Houlton Center, and one hosted by the Caribou
Rotary Club during the Caribou Craft Fair. In
addition, the Limestone Rotary Club spread
awareness during its 64th Annual Auction, and
the Washburn Rotary Club hosted a World Polio
Day fundraiser earlier in the month—a “Skip-AMeal” activity, with proceeds going to the Purple
Pinkie Project. Combined efforts helped to raise
an estimated $2,600 for global polio eradication
efforts.
A TAMC employee gets her pinkie painted purple by
UMPI student Kaitlyn Belanger as fellow student Shane
Belanger looks on. Students from UMPI’s BioMedical
Club staffed two tables at TAMC during Purple Pinkie
Project efforts held on Oct. 24, which is celebrated
internationally as World Polio Day.
In an effort closer to home, the University
began offering its new Sustainable Agriculture
concentration, within the Environmental Science
and Sustainability program, this fall to support
local agricultural interests and provide skilled
workers for one of the region’s primary economic
drivers. This is the only agricultural-related
bachelor’s degree programs being offered north
of Orono. UMPI faculty designed a diversified,
interdisciplinary concentration that looks at
agriculture from an environmental science and
sustainability perspective. Based around the
concept that sustainability is environmental,
social, and economic, students who take the
concentration will complete a core of agriculturefocused courses and a complement of other
science, climate, energy, business, and GIS
courses. The concentration prepares graduates
for many different types of agriculture-related
ventures, from large commercial farms to small,
diversified farms to other agri-businesses.
To learn more about these and other exciting
things happening at UMPI, visit www.umpi.edu.
Presque Isle Rotarians Jim Bubar, Mark Putnam and Rick
Duncan paint pinkies purple at Presque Isle High School
on Oct. 23 as part of the World Polio Day and Purple
Pinkie Project celebration that stretched across central
Aroostook County in October.
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