I'd once again like to thank everyone who supported our group in the Pepsi contest. The first half of our grant, $5,000 was delivered in July, and I just began purchasing the costumes with it. We do not get the second half until I write a mid-term report and submit all receipts showing I purchased the same items that I had budgeted for. I won't post pictures of our costumes until they make their debut in the near future...Thanks to the following Portage businesses for sending votes our way:
YMCA, Aurelio's Pizza, Buffalo Wild Wings, Portage Chamber of Commerce, El Cantarito, Leo Hatch Realty, Dairy Queen, Ma's Li'l Champs, Portage Administration Building, Portage Township Schools. Thanks also to El Salto in Valparaiso. Special thanks to Munster resident Giovanni S. for his votes and donation of 75 bottles of Pepsi (contained Power Votes) and to Supermercado Ortega in Hammond for having customers send a free text vote as they were paying for their purchase. I just noticed I skipped a post by not mentioning that between the time period when I posted we had 6 1/2 hours to go and were in the #8 spot, we slipped to #13 by 6:00pm! So I did go buy those 2 liters I was talking about for the "power codes", 75 to be exact. Those codes pushed us to the #3 spot at 9pm!
Well, we did officially finish in the #4 spot and I have already been contacted by Pepsi to complete my paperwork, which is due June 10. I submitted it at 3pm today :) Thank you to all who supported us in this endeavor. Voting ended at 11pm our time. At 10:30, we were in the #4 spot. The site is down for maintenance and won't be back up again until tomorrow afternoon. Our chances look good, but I take nothing for granted. See you tomorrow.
![]() We're at #8. On our way to go stand at intersections for final votes...I'm going to buy at least 50 2 liters of Pepsi too. Let me know if you want one... Remember, last chance, if you haven't voted at all, please consider voting today, IT'S FREE:) Text the message 105853 to the number 73774(pepsi). Thank you, and I'll post again at 11:00pm tonight. ![]() And we fell all the way to #14 at 1pm today. After 2 solid weeks at #5, this was completely disheartening. We're at #12 as of 7pm, but you have to keep an eye on the others because they have strategies in place. We could easily lose this despite all of our efforts. Remember voting ends at 11pm tomorrow central standard time. If our school could have texted for just one solid week we may not be in this much trouble. Oh well. Which reminds me, our Superintendent is in full support of our efforts. I'll have to post his letter. Right now though, here are pictures of the group in their first parade :) I wish I could've gotten on a plane, gone to a warm island and just relaxed this long weekend without thinking about this contest. I'm nervous because I won't see my students this weekend and I'm worried we're going to lose a lot of votes. We actually hit #4 yesterday! We're at #6 now, I just don't want to hit #11 again. TOO SCARY! We will be in the Memorial Day parade, handing out flyers and getting as many texts as possible. We're going to go out today and stand at different businesses asking people to text. Tuesday we plan an all out text day. We have several places that will let us stand at their entrance asking people to text.
Here's something interesting for you: guess who saw a blue Pepsi carton on Lute Rd., noticed the magic word "REFRESH", and pulled over to get the code inside?? Yes, it was me. The code was only worth 5 votes, but hey, I didn't have to buy a case of Pepsi to get the code :) ![]() Today was interesting because the Pepsi site was down for "scheduled" maintenance. Our class went on a field trip, so while none of my students were voting, we slipped from #7 to #9, which again goes to show how every vote counts. We have people from different businesses and even different states voting for us, but it takes daily votes to stay in the running; you cannot take a day off from voting. Once we got back from the field trip and voted, we went back to #8. Then of course we slipped back to #9. My husband, Vanessa and I then went to 6th grade orientation night at our middle school, and there were so many people in the gym, that I said to my principal, "you are not going to let this entire group of people leave without letting me tell them to text, are you?" Being supportive of our cause, and not wanting to go through this Pepsi contest ever again, she let me address the audience, and guess what happened? We moved back up to the #8 spot. Here's a pic of what Vanessa and I were wearing today :)
Students have been bringing me power codes this week, and from Monday to today the total power codes have been worth approximately 600 votes. Even with all of those votes, which do not include all of the regular votes from our supporters, we have yet to move back to the #5 spot. This goes to show just how many votes it does take to move up. EVERY VOTE COUNTS; EVERY TEXT COUNTS! Please do not skip a day of voting. The upcoming holiday weekend is making me nervous because people forget to vote on weekends, especially students. We cannot afford to lose votes when we are so close to the end.
Look around Portage and you should see flyers displayed at local businesses, and announcements on business marquees. I'll post pictures of those and list our supporters by Friday. I interviewed our dance group today and hope to have the video uploaded by tomorrow. This will give you a chance to know the girls in the group and find out how being a part of this group has affected them. We have fallen all the way down to the #10 spot. We keep moving back and forth between the #9 and #10 spots, so that means there are not a lot of votes separating us from the next group. I may have to invest in buying $100-$200 worth of 2 liter Pepsi's. If we win $10K in the end, it will be worth it. Last night was the Willowcreek Middle School talent show. There were three categories: dance/skit, singing, and instrumental. I'm proud to say the Ballet Folklorico took 1st place in the dance category. The crowd loved them! DAY 22 - It's 10:30 pm and we went from the #5 spot to the #8 spot in only five hours! We still have over a week to go, so we cannot slip like this on the weekends! Next weekend is a long weekend, which means more days to LOSE votes. Every online vote is important, every text is important! Don't forget, one person is allowed to vote THREE TIMES for the same cause-1) make a Pepsi account and sign in, 2) sign in through facebook if you have a facebook account, and 3) text.
Also, we need the yellow caps on the Pepsi bottles as they contain power votes! Collect all you can and drop them off at Willowcreek Middle School. |
Archives
September 2011
Categories |