The Junior Purple Society is a school sanctioned, student run club for students grade 1 through college. The Junior Purple Society club involves students in providing local resources, hope, and inspiration to childhood cancer patients and their families. While engaged in community service, the students will learn valuable lessons in humanity, compassion, and leadership. The Junior Purple Society Clubs visit local hospitals, deliver food to families in active treatment, deliver Nitalia’s Blankets to children in the hospital, visit children in treatment, plan and execute awareness campaigns, and many other activities.
It’s easy to setup your schools club:
Recruit a Few “Start Up” People
Recruit 3-6 people to help you get your school club up and running. If you have too many people during this preliminary stage, important decisions will take more time.
Find a Teacher Sponsor
When choosing a candidate these points can be helpful:
- Member of the faculty /staff that has a strong commitment to working with youth and is well respected among the students.
- Some degree of experience in managing young volunteers.
- Familiarity with The Purple Society mission.
Get the Approval from The Purple Society
- Contact The Purple Society, and set up a meeting with a representative responsible for managing the Junior Purple Society.
- Fill out our online Junior Purple Society registration form.
Get the Approval from Your School
- Find out what are the specific requirements of your school for starting a club. This is especially important if you want to receive school funding or resources such as meeting rooms and permission to hold your events on campus.
- Put together a presentation that articulates the importance and benefits for having a Junior Purple Society Club in your school.
- Often school approval stipulates that you should have:
- A constitution.
- Club leadership positions.
- A club sponsor.
Advertise and Recruit Members
Have an accurate understanding of the number of members you need when starting a club; a big membership base and not a good plan to involve them will just lead to frustrations. Your Junior Purple Society “start-up”group should brainstorm what you need members for, how many members and the best way to recruit them.
Some effective ways to recruit new members:
- School’s club week.
- Reaching out to other clubs.
- Personal connections.
- Posting fliers on busy parts of campus.
- Newspaper/Radio/TV.
- Facebook /Social Media.
Hold the First Club Meeting
- Invite your primary contact from The Purple Society to join the meeting to answer questions, provide support and guidance in setting up the action plan for the club.
- Find out what interests the members, brainstorm ideas.
- Collect members’ contact information; so that you can set up the next meeting.
- Elections: inform members about available positions and request applications.
- Announce when and where the next meeting is being held.
- Read your constitution.
- Read your Code of conduct.
Keep in Contact with The Purple Society
The club and the teacher sponsor should make sure that they keep in touch with the The Purple Society. We recommend the club have meetings once per month. Any questions you may have regarding starting your club, please call us at 602-326-7723.