Four professors, six students, three teams, all with one goal &- to be smarter than a professor with a Ph.D.
About 200 people attended Alpha Kappa Psi’s charity fundraiser “Are You Smarter than a Ph.D?” Monday at the School of Management Auditorium.
A panel consisting of SMG senior lecturer David Randall, assistant professor Kabrina Chang, lecturer Raymond Wilson and lecturer Mark Roberts teamed up with SMG freshmen Ronald Quintero and Jordan Evangelista and SMG juniors Sammy Dolah, Jehan Hamedi, John Teltsch and Emily DeRevere for the competition in which each team raised money for a charity of their choice.
The three teams were “Le Hombres de B5” (Quintero and Evangelista supporting the American Cancer Society), “Team Dixon” (Dolah and Hamedi, supporting the Boys and Girls Club of Boston) and “Team Barracuda” (Teltsch and DeRevere, supporting the American Red Cross).
Like the FOX TV game show, “Are You Smarter than a Fifth Grader?” contestants had the option to use lifelines such as copy, save and peek.
Associate SMG professor Peter Arnold played host and asked questions to the three teams.
Questions varied from topics such as pop culture, Boston University trivia, statistics, accounting, law and marketing.
“The event is always fun,” Arnold said. “It helps worthwhile charities in the Boston area, we have a lot of fun and it makes a lot of sense to do it.”
The fundraiser has been going on for the last five to six years, Arnold said.
“This event is about helping charities and having fun,” he said. “I think that’s an important lesson to learn, that you always need to be involved in what goes on in the community and giving back.”
Team Dixon won first place, Team Barracuda won second and Le Hombres de B5 took third.
“We were just joking around,” said Hamedi, a member of Team Dixon. “We weren’t expecting such a hard bunch of questions, but we were coming through and professor Chang saved us on one. Overall I thought it was really good time.”
SMG junior and Alpha Kappa Psi Executive Vice President Crystal Choy thought the best part was the collaborative effort to raise money for a good cause.
“It was something fun going on with the professors and students together, raising money to donate to charities and raise awareness about these organizations,” she said. “It’s definitely about getting involved.”
Audience members said they enjoyed being spectators.
“I thought it was amazing. I loved that everyone was so revved up about it,” said attendee and SMG sophomore Leslie Mullings. “I loved the professors. You got to see the professors outside the usual classroom setting and I thought they really had personality.”
“The syllabus-related questions made for a good, quick review,” said attendee and SMG freshman Aaron Nair.
Alpha Kappi Psi President and SMG junior Lulu Li said she thought the event was a success.
“It’s a good way to help out charities and a good way to get the school involved,” she said.
“On top of that, it sparked from a good idea and it was a success last year so we decided to continue it.”
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