Marshall University’s chapter of Alpha Xi Delta celebrated Pi Day a little differently as they spent their March 14, working towards raising money for their philanthropy, Autism Speaks.

Alpha Xi Delta was originally planning an event called Pie a Xi, where Marshall students would have the opportunity to pay money to throw a pie into the face of one of the members of Alpha Xi Delta. But with the cold change in temperature and the snow that began to fall, a change had to be made to the program.

“We had all these cream pies that we were going to give out and we actually just decided that we would just give them out,” Kasey Rhodes, scrapbook chair and new member assistant, said.

Instead of charging people for the opportunity to pie them, Alpha Xi Delta began accepting donations to give to their philanthropy organization, Autism Speaks.

“If we can raise awareness for Autism Speaks with anyway possible, then we will always want to go for that,” Rhodes said. “We love just getting involved and giving stuff out, so it’s always fun for us, regardless of what we do.”

Alpha Xi Delta new philanthropy assistant, Megan Chafin, said it is important for fraternities and sororities to be involved in fundraising for philanthropy.

“I feel like the philanthropy is the base of the fraternity or sorority and that supporting them shows that, how the stereotypes of Greek life that, ‘oh they just party,’ things like that, that they actually do help the community,” Chafin said. “Actually shows that they are in it to help raise

awareness and help fund other organizations to better sustain other organizations and help make the community better.”

Rhodes said she thinks that, just like any other organization on campus, giving back is a major part of it all.

“If people just join a sorority or fraternity just to do it, then it just kind of defeats the purpose of being an organization,” Rhodes said. “Like, pretty much everyone has that goal of doing something when they join an organization, whether it’s the gardening club where they do community service and grow stuff, or like us where we raise money for Autism Speaks.”

Marshall’s chapter of Alpha Xi Delta held a pie themed event last year, as well as this year. This year, all proceeds were given to the organization Autism Speaks.

Matthew Groves can be contacted at [email protected].