On Saturday, March 12, 2005, as part of the News & Observer‘s annual Kids Day fundraiser, a Penny Jar Championship event took place at Crabtree Valley Mall. WRAL-TV’s Valonda Calloway emceed the event and thanked each and every child who donated pennies to support children’s emergency services at WakeMed. Nearly $5,000 was collected at the event.
 WRAL’s Valonda Calloway interviews a young participant as she emcees the Penny Jar event. |
 Kids from all across the Triangle bring their pennies for the Penny Jar event. |
WRAL-TV and sister radio station MIX 101.5 both had booths at the Penny Jar event, handing out goodies to the kids who attended. Photos from the event will be posted on WRAL.com in the Community section.
 Children participate in a variety of activities at the Kids Day fundraiser. |
 WRAL’s Valonda Calloway thanks each child for her donation. |
WRAL-TV, along with MIX 101.5, is an annual sponsor of the Kids Day event. The News and Observer sells a special Kids Day edition of the newspaper for $1 per copy, with 75 cents going directly to help the kids who receive care at WakeMed. Kids Day papers include special content about WakeMed’s care for children and were available only through advance orders or from sales volunteers on Tuesday, March 15th.
 WRAL Staffers Loretta Harper-Arnold (l to r), Valonda Calloway & Debbie Strange help make the Penny Jar event a success. |
Kids Day 2005 dollars were designated for children’s emergency services at WakeMed’s three full-service, 24-hour emergency departments in Raleigh, Cary and North Raleigh (opening this summer). All three facilities are staffed with physicians and nurses trained in both adult and pediatric emergency medicine and are equipped to meet the needs of our children.
In its first three years, Kids Day supporters raised more than $250,000 for WakeMed. The money helped expand and specially equip the Level III Intensive Care Nursery, which cares for the Triangle community’s premature and critically ill infants, and expanded the state’s first freestanding children’s emergency department which cares for over 40,000 kids each year.
Thanks to WRAL-TV’s Debbie Strange for this capcom story
& Bill Reeves for these capcom photos.