Barrett Leadership and Service Team Downtown and the Downtown Programming Advisory Board are launching a weeklong “penny war” competition today between the academic colleges to raise money for the ASU4Food campaign.
“Penny Wars was originally started by the downtown PAB, and BLAST’D decided to jump on board in support of ASU4Food,” said Caroline Porter, president of BLAST’D.
The ASU4Food campaign, based in Tempe, is benefiting a larger “food fight” between Arizona State University and the University of Arizona, which ends April 18. The ASU vs. UA Food Fight, sponsored by State Farm through the Territorial Cup Series, is “a competition between the two rivaling universities to see who can raise the most donations, both monetary, and food for their local food banks,” according to the organization’s website
All the money raised by ASU is going to St. Mary’s Food Bank, which they have been donating to all semester.
“We actually had a speaker from St. Mary’s come to one of our (BLAST’D) meetings and he told us about their intense level of need, so we’re more motivated than ever to help them out however we can,” Porter said.
From April 5-9, BLAST’D members will be tabling on Taylor Mall and in Taylor Place with containers for each of the academic colleges on the Downtown campus. Students put pennies in their school’s container to support them and silver coins in the other colleges’ containers to take points away from them.
At the moment, Porter said, the prize for the winner is pride, especially because it is ASU’s first year competing in the game.
“U of A has been working on this food fight for longer than ASU has, so we’re really trying to establish ourselves in the competition,” she said.
The penny war competition is part of this week’s Spring Festival activities, but the lack of clear information concerning the event was a source of confusion for journalism freshman Victoria Morrow.
She said on the Facebook event page, it only says that money will “make a difference” and “the team that earns the most points will earn a pizza party for up to 25 people.”
“If it’s for a charity or organization I support, I’ll definitely participate and get others to participate too,” Morrow said. “I care more about that than competing for a pizza party.”
After knowing the competition benefited St. Mary’s Food Bank, Morrow said she was more interested in getting involved and didn’t really care which college her money went to as long as it supported the food bank.
Journalism freshman Evie Carpenter said St. Mary’s it is important to support St. Mary’s, but it may be difficult to motivate students to get involved in the competition.
“It is also difficult for any group to rally up an entire campus, but I think BLAST’D can do it and I think that everyone should pitch in to help them out,” she said.
Contact the reporter at naberra@asu.edu
