WHAT IS OPERATION SMILE SHAMROCK FINAL MILE? The Operation Smile Shamrock Final Mile is designed to teach kids just like you the importance of exercise, commitment and giving back in your community. Through Operation Smile you also learn the value of giving to others. Students ages 5 to 12 can participate and it s easy! You will run 25.2 miles before race day, just a few miles a week! For each mile you run, you can collect a small pledge and reach the $240 that it takes to change a child s life! Then you and other students will come together to run your Final Mile to complete a marathon at the Virginia Beach Oceanfront on Saturday, March 19, 2016 as a part of the Shamrock Marathon Weekend. You can log miles in PE class, a running club, or with friends and family after school. So join in, run for a great cause, get fit, and help someone else along the way! WHY IS THE OPERATION SMILE FINAL MILE IMPORTANT? Getting fit and staying healthy are important for your mind and body! It helps you feel good about yourself and even helps you learn better at school. Not only will help yourself, but you ll help others too! Not every boy or girl is able to go to school, sometimes kids with cleft lips and cleft palates are bullied and made fun of making the thought of going to school very scary. By raising money for Operation Smile, you are helping a child with a cleft to get the surgery he or she needs giving them a chance to smile. Did you know that it takes as little as $240 and as few as 45 minutes to change a child s life forever? WHY DO YOU RUN? YOU RUN TO Have Fun - Run with your friends and family! Stay Healthy Run to get fit & exercise! Heal Smiles - Run to raise money for Operation Smile!
STEPS FOR STUDENT PARTICIPATION STEP 1: CREATE A GOAL Talk to the Final Mile Coordinator at your school to learn about your school s fundraising goal and what your school is hoping to accomplish by participating in the Operation Smile Shamrock Final Mile. To help achieve your school goal - create a personal fundraising goal. Remember it only takes $240.00 to change one child s life. If your school doesn t have a Final Mile Coordinator, try to find a teacher who is willing to take on that role. If you can t find one, that s ok! You can still collect donations yourself to achieve your own personal goal. STEP 2: FUNDRAISE FOR OPERATION SMILE Use the SmileTracker: Our SmileTracker is a fun and easy way for you to raise money & track your pledges. The SmileTracker includes a donation log and a sleeve to collect pledges. There are 25 shamrock scratch-off-each represents a mile that you will run prior to the Final Mile. Ask a neighbor, family member or friend to sponsor a mile that you will run. Then scratch off the shamrock and reveal how much your sponsor will donate. Underneath, the sponsor will find a donation of $1, $5, $10, $15 or $20 to help you reach your goal of healing one smile! The best part about the SmileTracker is that it makes asking for donations fun! To request a SmileTracker please ask the Final Mile Coordinator at your school or email finalmile@operationsmile.org. Donate Online: Have friends and family that prefer to make an online donation? No problem! They can sponsor you through your school s team page link. See Step 3 for more information about how to find the team page. It s easy to share via email and social media. Even if your friends aren t running they can still help change a child s life by fundraising for you and your school s Final Mile team! Hold a School Fundraiser: You can hold a fundraiser at your school. We ve got studentapproved fundraising ideas later in this toolkit to help you get started!
STEP 3: FIND YOUR SCHOOL S TEAM PAGE ONLINE Find your school s team page to donate online. You can also share this page with your friends and family to donate on your behalf. This is another way to track your donations. To find your school s team page please visit www.operationsmile.org/finalmile and select FIND A TEAM in the left navigation. If you don t see your school and your school is participating, please ask the Final Mile Coordinator at your school to request a team page. If your school is not participating and you would like to fundraise as an individual please request an independent team page! To request an independent team page for yourself, please visit www.operationsmile.org/finalmile. Select Register and fill out the information to Request an Independent Team. You can personalize your page to include your efforts to support Operation Smile. Don t forget to include your fundraising goal! Once a team page has been created you will receive an email letting you know the school team page is ready to use. STEP 4: PROMOTE THE FINAL MILE TO YOUR FRIENDS AND FAMILY Help promote the event by telling your friends and family about Operation Smile Shamrock Final Mile and why you are running! Don t forget to also share your school s goals and online team fundraising page with your friends and family! STEP 5: REGISTER FOR THE RACE In order for you to participate in the Final Mile at the Shamrock Marathon, parents should register their students through the 2016 Shamrock Marathon website: http://www.shamrockmarathon.com/. This will include the race fee of $20.00 to J&A Racing. Remember the fee goes up closer to race day!
STEP 6: GET READY FOR THE RACE! Run 25.2 miles before race day, by running just a few miles a week! You can log miles in PE class, running club, or with friends and family after school! STEP 7: ASK YOUR FINAL MILE COORDINATOR TO SIGN UP FOR THE FINAL MILE CELEBRATION This year, in Honor of the 10th Operation Smile Shamrock Final Mile, we will be hosting a Final Mile Celebration on Friday, March 18, 2016 from 10:00 a.m.-1:00 p.m. This is a field trip opportunity for your school. We will be holding the Silly Shamrock Competition during the celebration this year. In order to go, your Final Mile Coordinator must RSVP for the event. Make sure you ask them to sign you and your friends up! STEP 8: SUBMIT DONATIONS Use the SmileTracker to collect your cash or check donations. All checks should be made payable to Operation Smile. We want to give receipts to all donors properly for their donation to Operation Smile. To facilitate this, we ask that you help us by carefully tracking donor s information in the SmileTracker. Submit your donations by returning the SmileTracker to your Final Mile Coordinator at school or to the Operation Smile table at the Final Mile Expo the day prior to the event. If you miss this deadline please send checks to Student Programs at Operation Smile Headquarters: ATTN: Operation Smile Final Mile, 3641 Faculty Blvd. Virginia Beach, VA 23453. Bundle donations together with the completed donation log in the SmileTracker for us to track the donations. Don t forget to thank your donors and congratulate yourself on a job well done!
STEP 9: FINAL MILE RACE! On March 19, 2016 you will run your "Final Mile" to complete a marathon at the Virginia Beach Oceanfront. Last year we had almost 5,000 elementary runners just like you! We are anticipating even more this year! STEP 10: STAY INVOLVED! There are many ways for you to get involved with Operation Smile in addition to just fundraising! Service projects are a great way to create awareness and provide for the children Operation Smile helps. Service projects include: Writing get well soon cards Smile bag item donation drive Sewing Smile bags Sewing Smile dolls Making banners to hang in hospitals Hosting a toy drive Making friendship bracelets For more information about service projects please visit http://www.operationsmile.org/content/community-fundraising-and-service-projects
FUNDRAISING IDEAS Students can collect their fundraising pledges several different ways. Here are a few ideas to get you and other students started: Host a lemonade or hot chocolate stand: Set up a stand to sell lemonade, hot chocolate or some other sort of drink at school or in a neighborhood. Sell candy-grams at school: Create bags of candy that students can buy for themselves, their peers or teachers at school. These candy-grams can have tags where students can write messages to the person they are sending them to. Host a pie your teacher in the face day: Place jars out at school with names of different teachers who students would like to pie in the face. Students can purchase tickets and write their name on the back of the ticket. The teacher who gets the most tickets will be pied in the face. Draw a ticket from that teacher s jar-whichever student entered that take gets to pie the teacher in the face. Host a bake sale at your school or in your neighborhood: Parents, students, administrators and/or neighbors can contribute baked goods for a one-day sale. Children and/or parents can be invited in to buy these treats for a great cause. Host week long coin wars throughout different grade levels at your school: Label a jar with each grade. Coins in the jar are worth positive points and bills are worth negative points. Students put coins in their own grade s jar and bills in other grades. Grades will compete to see who wins the most points at the end of the week. Hold a raffle: Sell tickets for the chance to win a particular prize this could be a basket of goods, a 50/50 draw for cash, or another prize donated by the community or school. Be creative and come up with your own ideas on how to receive donations. Don t forget to share those ideas with us at finalmile@operationsmile.org so we can share them with other students in the future.
OPERATION SMILE FACTS VISION Operation Smile dreams of a world where no child suffers from lack of access to safe surgery. ABOUT OPERATION SMILE Operation Smile is an international medical charity whose global network of thousands of credentialed medical volunteers from more than 80 countries is dedicated to helping improve the health and lives of children from more than 60 countries. Since its founding in 1982, Operation Smile has provided more than 240,000 free surgical procedures for children and young adults born with cleft lip, cleft palate and other facial deformities. To build long-term sufficiency in resource poor environments, Operation Smile trains doctors and local medical professionals in its partner countries so they are empowered to treat their local communities and help others around the world. Operation Smile also donates medical equipment and supplies and provides year-round medical treatments through its worldwide centers. URGENT NEED It is estimated that two billion people, or one-quarter of the world s population, lack access to basic surgical care. Every 3 minutes, a child is born somewhere in the world with a cleft lip or cleft palate. In many countries where we work, there are not enough trained medical professionals to handle the growing need and backlog of cleft cases. Lack of access to surgery is estimated to cause up to one-quarter of the death and disability that exists in the world. This significant burden of disease is rapidly growing and can be treated, alleviated or cured with surgery. The facts are staggering: each year more people die because of lack of access to surgical care than from HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria combined. Despite the significant volume of surgical procedures worldwide, lack of access to surgery remains a serious problem for the world s poor. While the wealthiest one-third of the world s population receive 75% of all surgical procedures, the poorest one-third of the world s population receive only 4%.
CLEFT LIP AND CLEFT PALATE A cleft is a gap in the mouth that didn't close during the early stages of pregnancy. It is estimated that, worldwide, a child is born every 3 minutes with a cleft about one in 750 births. It takes as few as 45 minutes and as little as $240 to repair a cleft lip or cleft palate. HISTORY Operation Smile was founded in 1982 by Dr. William (Bill) Magee Jr., a plastic surgeon, and his wife, Kathleen (Kathy) Magee, a nurse and clinical social worker. Operation Smile was launched with its first mission to the Philippines in 1982. OVERALL IMPACT TO DATE Operation Smile is one of the largest surgical organizations in the world. Operation Smile is the largest volunteer-based medical charity providing free cleft surgeries. Through our partnership with the American Heart Association we are one of the largest providers of life saving courses (Basic Life Support - BLS, Pediatric Advanced Life Support - PALS and Advanced Cardiac Life Support - ACLS) to resource-poor environments. Operation Smile is leading research into the causes of cleft lip and cleft palate, and its prevention, treatment and surgical outcomes. Operation Smile is a pioneer in advocating for the importance of safe surgery in resource-poor environments where the lack of safe surgery accounts for 11% of all death and disability. We listen to our patients to understand what prevents them from accessing care so we can break down those obstacles for children and families who need surgery. Operation Smile increases overall surgical capacity and cleft treatment in communities where we work by providing health care workers with medical equipment, supplies, education and training. We demonstrate industry-leading clinical management practices through our Global Standards of Care, which help ensure we provide the best quality of care for our patients around the world. Operation Smile has provided over 240,000 free surgeries to children with cleft lip, cleft palate and other facial deformities.
There are hundreds of registered Operation Smile Student Clubs worldwide with a network of more than 18,000 students building awareness, raising funds and educating others about core values of commitment, leadership and volunteerism. Operation Smile Student Programs empowers youth, creating a global movement for positive change through our four pillars of philanthropy: Leadership, Education, Service, and Awareness. ABOUT OPERATION SMILE S GLOBAL HEADQUARTERS Operation Smile s Global Headquarters is located in Virginia Beach, Virginia, and is equipped with industry leading technology to operate as an educational hub connecting educators and trainees around the world.
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS Question: Answer: Question: Answer: Question: Answer: Question: Answer: Question: Answer: Question: Answer: Can Operation Smile sponsor me? No. Operation Smile cannot sponsor, solicit sponsorship or reimburse expenses for fundraising events. How will the money be used? A gift made through your fundraising efforts represents a gift to the entire Operation Smile mission and will help to heal children s smiles throughout the globe. Do I need to give receipts to the donors who make donations? Donors will be given receipts for by Operation Smile Headquarters if the proper information is recorded. Please fill out the donation log in the SmileTracker for donors to be given receipts. What should a donor do if they want to donate after the event? If the event is over and you have already submitted funds to Operation Smile, donors can send their checks to the Operation Smile Headquarters (3641 Faculty Blvd. Virginia Beach, VA 23453). Your donor can also give a gift by credit card by calling Operation Smile Headquarters at 757.321.7645 Monday-Friday, 8:30 A.M.-5:30 P.M. E.S.T. When submitting either by check or by credit card, the donor should provide the event name, Operation Smile Shamrock Final Mile, and the student s name. We will be happy to accept their donation. If I collect checks or cash, who should I send it to? You should turn all donations into your Final Mile Coordinator at your school or to the Operation Smile table at the Final Mile Expo the day prior to the event. If you miss this deadline, please send checks to Student Programs at Operation Smile Headquarters. See address above. Bundle donations together with the completed donation log in the SmileTracker for us to track the donations. Can I keep the cash collected and write a check from my own checking account? Yes, however names and addresses and the amount they gave in cash must be entered on the donation log in the SmileTracker in order for them to receive a receipt. Please note any additional amount that you are including as your own donation so you can receive a receipt as well.
STUDENT PLEDGE Since 2006, the Final Mile program has helped heal over 1,500 smiles that s 1,500 brighter futures created, lives saved, and families transformed forever! You can make a difference in the lives of children around the world while having fun! Take the pledge and share the Operation Smile mission with friends and family. Sign your name below to take the pledge! I,, pledge to run 25.2 miles between now and the Shamrock Marathon Weekend on March 19, 2016. On race day I will cross the finish line to complete my Final Mile. Help me help other by pledging per mile! I am going the extra mile to help kids receive new smiles! I am collecting donations for Operation Smile, any amount raised will help give new smiles for children in need.