Students pie professors in McNutt event

Whipped cream went flying Thursday night as students seized an unusual opportunity to get back at their professors.

The Civic Leadership Development Group had the eighth annual Pie-A-Professor event in the McNutt Quad South Dining Hall.

This year’s beneficiary is First Book Monroe County, an organization that provides children of low-income families with new books.

“Most families with low incomes don’t have a single book for their children,” campaign chair Patty Callison said. “First Book makes sure they get a brand new book to take home to call their own. We can buy hard-covered children’s books for $2.50, so we make every dollar go very far.”

The Civic Leadership Development Group is in the Kelley Institute and consists of about 1,800 active volunteers. The CLD created seven teams that competed in order to win the top fundraiser trophy.

Fundraising began six weeks ago through donations. Donations could be given online by anyone, and people who donated were entered into a prize-drawing bucket. Prizes included coupons from sponsors, such as Hoosier Heights, IU Auditorium, Chipotle and Pizza X. Donations could be made until the end of the event.

Board members of the marketing committee served as mentors for each group, and faculty members were pied. The teams that competed were Team Ford, Team Women in Business, Team Head and Beta Alpha Psi, Team Dayton, Team Sparks, Team Goerner and Team Kreft.

Emma Harowski, vice president of the marketing committee, was the mentor for Team Goerner.

“I started my freshman year because I like volunteering,” she said. “I really like the fact that it’s an oasis away from the college bubble.”

The event began with a short video explaining the purpose of First Books, featuring popular children’s book authors such as Tony DiTerlizzi and Holly Black, authors of “The Spiderwick Chronicles.” The video also featured Kyle Zimmer, the founder of First Books.

The Pie-A-Professor event went on by alternating between pie-ing the faculty members and drawing tickets for prizes. There were also tickets sold for pizza and subs, as well as a pie-eating contest.

Five audience members competed in the apple-pie eating contest. The winner received a pass to Hoosier Heights, and the other competitors won PIE T-shirts.

The event ended with the announcement of the total and winners. PIE raised $8,296.50 this year.

“We are blown away by the generosity and the way funds were raised this year,” Callison said. “We had so much fun, and I am so full of pizza. I want to let you know the children in Monroe County will cherish these books and take them to bed with them because they belong to them.”

Team Kreft won the top fundraiser trophy with a total of $2,161 in donations. Steven Kreft, clinical associate professor of business economics, won the title for the second year. Team mentor Nilesh Agrawal said Kreft enjoys PIE more than anyone else.

He got more pies in the face than any other faculty member, with a total of six received.

Kreft said he has been involved since the event began. He won last year and wore a dress and heels from My Sister’s Keeper, last year’s beneficiary. This year he promises to dress as the Little Mermaid in lecture next week.

“When I walk in with that trophy, the outfit won’t feel that bad,” Kreft said. “The reason I kept coming back every year is because of the healthy competition between colleagues for a great cause. I love to see that rivalry when we fundraise.”