Pumpkin Smash | Photo by Abigail Abbott | The Wright State Guardian
On Thursday, Oct. 26, students gathered in the Hamilton Plaza to relieve post-midterm stress with a pumpkin decorating and smashing event hosted by Miracle Makers.
About Miracle Makers
Miracle Makers, a prominent non-profit campus organization, fundraises and raises awareness for Dayton Children's Hospital. According to President Ashley Greene, a junior majoring in organization leadership, Miracle Makers is the largest philanthropic organization on campus.
Vice President of Marketing and senior Maria Washler joined Miracle Makers for this philanthropic mission.
“I joined two years ago, but my reasoning changed a lot throughout but definitely just helping the kids. I actually went to Dayton Children’s. I was treated in Dayton Children’s, so I think just helping out something that's super close to me really means a lot to me,” Washler said.
While the organization’s main event of the year is the Raiderthon dance marathon—which is hosted every spring semester and raises tens of thousands of dollars every year—the pumpkin smashing event was a casual event to raise awareness for the organization and have fun.
Smashing pumpkins
After seeing a similar event online, Greene felt inspired to create the pumpkin smashing event with the addition of decorating, which was never done before by Miracle Makers.
“I’ve never done it before, and I thought, ‘Why not have people paint the pumpkins?’ It's always fun, and people are able to carve them too, and it's a stressful time. People just got over midterms, so we wanted to have a little holiday fun and get some stress out by hitting some pumpkins,” Greene said.
Attendees could also learn more about Miracle Makers on a table adjacent to the decorating. Attendees could grab a free pen or wristband, a Dayton Children’s sticker, an informational handout on Raiderthon or see where donations went within the hospital.
When 7:30 p.m. rolled around, so did the smashin’.
Armed with a baseball bat and goggles, each participant could individually smash their pumpkins on a tarp on the North Lawn.
Freshman Samantha Yates took a swing at the event to fulfill an Honors class requirement.
“It felt good. I have a lot of stress right now, so [it was] very stress-relieving,” Yates said.
According to Greene, Miracle Makers would love to do an event of this nature again in the future.
