One Heart, a student organization dedicated to fighting child sexual abuse, has organized a “Blue Out” for the September 22^nd home football game against Temple.

Below is the description of the Blue Out, found on the event’s website:

The Penn State family remains dedicated to making things right.

In addition to wearing blue (the nationally-recognized color of child abuse prevention) on September 22, 2012, this year’s student Blue Out organizers ask for your help in creating a stronger community and preventing future injustices.

Please make (and share) one personal promise that affirms your commitment to altruism. Together, we will see the power of individual resolutions multiplied on a grand scale.

Together, we will show the world what Penn State truly represents.

Last year’s Blue Out, organized by graduate students Stuart Shapiro and Laura March, was a huge success, and focused the public’s attention and sympathy toward sexual abuse victims while raising $47,000 for Pennsylvania’s Coalition Against Rape (PCAR) and Prevent Child Abuse PA. Now, Shapiro and March hope to continue this success of the first memorable Blue Out.

Through a partnership with both One Heart and the Penn State Athletics Department, Shapiro and March hope to turn Blue Out into a football tradition, so that Penn State students will continue to stand united in the fight against child sexual abuse.

“We are aiming for [the Blue Out] to become an annual event like THON as a way to never forget our continuous responsibility to make our communities better,” says Shapiro.

Shapiro also told us that closer to the date of the Blue Out, One Heart also will be holding events around their central theme, “One Promise”. “We ask all participants [in the One Promise campaign] to make one personal promise for how they will make their individual world better,” says Shapiro.

The efforts of students such as Shapiro and March show that, despite calls for the “death penalty” for Penn State football and punishment for the university as a whole, Penn State students are looking forward, beyond just the Sandusky scandal, toward constructively tackling the wider problem of child sexual abuse. Eric Jansen, co-founder and co-president of One Heart said, “Now is the time to embrace the new Penn State, band together, and do as much as we can to fight child abuse.”

For more information about Blue Out, visit their website or email them at [email protected]. You can join the Blue Out conversation by tweeting @BlueOut with the hashtag #OnePromise.