Hey everyone, Eric here from Comet Life! I, and the rest of our student-led team, hoped you all had a fantastic PRIDE Month – whether you celebrated that with friends, family, over zoom calls, or by supporting some awesome movements that are going on in the world right now. Wherever you are, we hope things went well. <3
Let’s be honest, this was definitely not the Summer we all imagined 6 months ago – and a lot has changed in the world. But that did not stop us from coming together, digitally, and celebrating PRIDE, together!
This past month, the Comet Life Student Organization at The University of Texas at Dallas organized a #CometPride fundraiser to help raise funds for the UT Dallas Galerstein Gender Center as well as The Trevor Project; LGBT+ supporting organizations. While we were not able to celebrate PRIDE physically as we normally do through parades, the Comet Community was able to come together and help support a great cause through some great threads.
Our team at Comet Life helped create some awesome limited-time apparel and merchandise, “#CometPride Apparel” as we called it, and sold them through an awesome campaign service known as Bonfire. With the massive help and support of the Comet Community, we were able to sell a total of 109 shirts/hoodies/tanktops, raising a total of $361.08 for the Gender Center & Trevor Project.
Feel free to watch our Unboxing Video & Fundraiser Recap below!
Now Selling #CometPride Masks, Stickers, and Apparel
From the massive support we had behind #CometPride, along with many questions if we could launch face-masks given the current situations, we have launched another merchandise store on Redbubble where students can purchase #CometPride Masks & Stickers (additionally in other sexuality/gender-identity PRIDE flag variations)! Weren’t able to purchase a #CometPride hoodie, shirt, or tanktop in time for our fundraiser? We are still selling some limited-time apparel on our Bonfire Page! Profits starting July 1st will go towards the Comet Life Student Organization to help support our initiatives to increase school spirit & campus life on campus at UT Dallas.
#CometPride Group Photo Event
Comet Life, along with the UTD Gender Center, will be organizing a time in the fall (virtually or in-person, when the time is right) a group picture with everyone who purchased a #CometPride merchandise item! So be sure to stay tuned on our social media channels on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, Discord, and even TikTok when we send out more details in the near future!
A Final Thank You
Anyways, we just wanted to say again a special thank you to Matt & team from the UTD Gender Center, Paul & team from the Office of Communications, and every other department/individual who helped share or support our fundraiser. It truly was awesome to see an idea we had a few weeks before PRIDE Month (June) turned into a reality, and turned into a great impact for some awesome organizations.
With that being said, we hope you all have a great rest of your Summer and hope to see you all when the school year starts again (whether that’s virtually or in-person)! Whoosh!
Questions or inquiries in regards to the #CometPride Student-Made Merchandise! Shoot us an email at [email protected]!
