Some students are trying to start a new fraternity, and they want your blood – for a good cause.

Phi Sigma Kappa, a currently nonchartered fraternity, will host a blood drive in conjunction with the Santa Barbara Tri-County Blood Bank today in the Freebirds parking lot. The drive will start at noon and last until 4 p.m, and all blood donated will go to the Tri-County Blood Bank. Armen Boyajian, Phi Sigma Kappa’s director of the blood drive, said the fraternity originally planned to start at 1 p.m., but students showed a high interest in donating blood.

“We got a lot of interest; that’s why we extended the hours,” he said.

Barbara Hoose, Tri-County Blood Bank technical director, said the organization is critically low on type A and type O blood.

“We generally need 150 donations a day to supply our local need,” she said.

While Freebirds is sponsoring the event, the restaurant’s owner, Mark Orfalea, won’t be giving away free burritos, Boyajian said.

“He’s helping us out by letting us use his parking lot during high business hours at lunchtime,” he said.

Phi Sigma Kappa is trying to rebuild its membership and get its charter reinstated by the national organization, Boyajian said.

“We’re just trying to build the house back up so we’ve been trying to build up the charter for May 1,” he said.