Student Math Contest Adds Up to Millions of Dollars for Hospital

St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, in Memphis, raised $15-million last year with its annual “math-a-thon,” a nationwide competition for students in kindergarten through eighth grade.

The hospital has held the math-a-thon every year for more than 30 years. It uses a telemarketing campaign that reaches out to teachers and school principals to get schools to participate. Teachers in about 12,000 schools agreed to offer the contest in their classrooms last year.

The hospital works with Scholastic to produce a series of books designed to supplement the teaching curriculum at each grade level. But the books also seek to teach students to give to others by offering fun ways to raise money to help St. Jude scientists and doctors fight childhood cancers and other diseases.

Students who participate in the contest collect pledges from friends and family members for each problem they solve correctly and the money is sent to St. Jude. The hospital offers prizes, with the most-attractive prizes awarded to students who raise the most.

The math-a-thon is just one aspect of St. Jude’s effort to give people at nearly every age a chance to support its work, beginning with a “trike-a-thon,” a tricycle race for toddlers held at daycare centers and preschools across the country.

Successful events like these have helped St. Jude’s keep a high spot on the Philanthropy 400, The Chronicle‘s annual ranking of American charities that raise the most money.