While Dave Clarke was working double duty Sunday as coach and professor, his QU101 class raised $700 for charity and his women’s soccer team beat Fairleigh Dickinson 6-0.

Clarke’s class held “Halloween Bash,” an event raising money for the Children’s Center of Hamden, as a long-term class project at the women’s soccer game on Halloween.

“We were hoping that more of the student body would show up; however, we were able to raise over $500 and donate over $200 worth of food to the children’s center,” Project Manager Mary Corrado said.

The class sold baked goods, candy, hot chocolate, apple cider, and coffee as concessions at the Senior Day game. Students collected items as donations from local businesses and Quinnipiac organizations to raffle off at the game. Prizes ranged from women’s hockey sweatshirts to Wentworth’s ice cream gift cards.

“The class is about seeing what we can gain from the community and we went out and got so many donations from the community, so we did a pretty good job on that,” Corrado said.

The class wanted to keep the event community-based, and decided on a local charity right in town.

“I was very excited about it,” Director of Personnel and Development at the Children’s Center of Hamden Diane Surprenant said. “We’re always excited when Quinnipiac gets involved because the students here have a lot of energy and they really want to do good for the kids.”

In addition to the money raised, the students decided to donate all unsold food and candy.

“The community came together in order to help the Children’s Center of Hamden, and Ms. Surprenant walked away with a lot of nice Halloween candy to bring back to the kids and they’re going to be excited,” Clarke’s student Abigail Brown said.

Now that the event is completed, the students’ work is far from over.

“The next step is having the students think about the course objectives in QU101,” Clarke said. “They are still expected to write up a report about the project, so it’s not a case of putting it on and that’s it. I mean, it’s part of it, but the most important thing is what they have learned. Now they’ve got to do the written portion of the event.”

Photo credit: Marcus Harun