While many students are focused on passing midterms and avoiding the October heat, members of one Cal State Long Beach fraternity are devoting their days, and nights, to biking for charity.
Members of the Pi Kappa Phi fraternity are riding stationary bicycles for 48 straight hours to help raise money for Push America, a national philanthropy organization dedicated to helping people with disabilities.
The fraternity’s mission is to encourage students and other Greek organizations to donate funds that help both disabled children and disabled adults.
“Our goal is to raise $10,000 this week,” Warren Claiborne, director for Push America at CSULB and Pi Kappa Phi member, said.
While some fraternity members could stay at the event for only a few hours, others stayed well over 12 hours.
“I was [at the event] for 18 hours,” Claiborne said. “I’m really proud of [the fraternity members] who are keeping their grades up and helping this cause.”
This is the third year that Pi Kappa Phi has held the event. According to Claiborne, Pi Kappa Phi raised $5,000 in its first year and $7,000 in its second year.
Nearly all of the fraternity’s members donated their time to Push America’s cause. Some Pi Kappa Phi members, like senior kinesiology major Kevin Vasquez, donated their time in between exams.
“The pain in your butt goes away after 45 minutes,” Vasquez said.
Vasquez said he planned on staying at the event throughout all of Wednesday night.
For other fraternity members, like junior geology major Jamie Fang, helping others is very important.
“It’s awesome fun [to bike] for a good cause,” Fang said.
If members had to go to class or take an exam, Fang said that the fraternity called in other members to take their place on the bikes.
In addition to those biking, some fraternity members helped by asking students for donations.
“It’s a great time,” international business major Daniel Diaz said. “Knowing what we are doing inspires us.”
Diaz said he had started biking at the event at 4:30 a.m. Wednesday.
To help promote fundraising, Pi Kappa Phi is also holding a fundraising competition between CSULB sororities. According to Claiborne, the sorority that donates the most to Push America will receive 10 percent of the profits to be given to the charity of its choice.
Last year’s sorority winner, Tri Delta, donated their winnings to an Alzheimer’s charity, according to Claiborne.
The event ends outside the Hall of Science at 9 a.m. today.