He pulled up the lyrics and sang, completely off-key, but with so much heart, the Brenda Lee hit. Back then students would sing for a few callers and play records for the rest. But over the years, the students decided it was more fun and festive to sing them all, said Kirsten Ruby, the university’s associate director of housing for communications.
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The number to call is 217-332-1882.
Students at the University of IL at Urbana-Champaign have manned the phones every holiday season for 56 years, according to the school’s website.
They have received more than 7,000 calls so far on the third day.
Typically the top song requested is Mariah Carey’s “All I Want For Christmas is You”, and it’s become so popular that the group now has a “Mariah Meter” to measure the requests and compare them to years past.
Last year, they had 339 requests for Mariah’s hit.
As Dial-A-Carol continues to get more and more press, phone wait times are sure to increase…there are only so many cheerful volunteers to go around!
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According to reports they’ll be taking calls until 11:59 p.m. on December 16.
