RSO holds pumpkin sale to raise money for charity

On Tuesday, a tractor was parked on the Trabant University Center patio, packed with 115 pumpkins to be sold by the Animal Science Club for $10 each.

The club's second annual fundraiser raised more than $860, and gained approximately 100 attendees.

Sophomore Stephanie Deal was walking by Trabant when she saw the tractor, and decided to buy a pumpkin.

"I'll probably tell friends about it when I get back to my room," she said.

Senior Holly Woodley heard about the sale through her roommate, and she said she decided to go because the pumpkins were less expensive in comparison to surrounding farms.

The event was made possible by the contributions of a university alumnus, Stewart Ramsey, who donated all of the pumpkins for the event.

Senior Alexandra Fetsko, vice president of the club, said the group has had a connection with Ramsey throughout the school year.       

This year, Ramsey had a bad season on his farm so instead of giving the club his own pumpkins like last year, he purchased the 115 pumpkins from a separate farm and gave them to the club for free.

"We have a lot of strong ties with local farms and that in of itself has given us good deals," Fetsko said.

The club also teamed up with the university's UDairy Creamery for the event. While the Animal Science Club sold pumpkins outside of Trabant, the Creamery served ice cream inside of the student center. The two organizations advertised each other's services during the event, and said they intend on equally splitting the total profits of both efforts.

The tractor on the patio was donated by the College of Agricultural and Natural Resources to hold and carry the pumpkins.

"Everything was donated, so most of the work I did for this event was to contact previous donors, like Stewart Ramsey and the university's farm," said junior Amanda Otteni, the club's treasurer.

The money generated from the pumpkin sale will be used for a variety of funds. Some of the money will go back to Ramsey's farms, and some will be donated to AgrAbility, which provides money and help to disabled farmers, Otteni said.

The remainder of the money will go to fund the club at NESA, the North East Student Affiliation agricultural competition, which will be in Rhode Island this year.

Though the club had serious plans about what to do with the money they generated from the event, the sale as a whole was meant as an entertaining fall activity.

"We hope students have fun and hope to do this every Halloween week," she said.