“Feeling the Love, Just with a Lot of Sugar”: Pie Day at Kappa Sigma Rush

By: Katie Betz, betzka@mnstate.edu

Photos by Alexis Walstrom, walstromal@mnstate.edu

Members of the fraternity Kappa Sigma were pied in the face and hair on Jan. 28 for a good cause. Passersby could buy a pie tin full of whipped cream for one dollar and slap it in the face or hair of Kappa Sigma members.

Mason Wede, majoring in computer information technology and history, is the grand master or president of Kappa Sigma. This is the first year they have had the pie event, and they are hoping to bring it back next year. Wede explained that Kappa Sigma got the inspiration from the Math Club’s Pi Your Professor event and consulted Leslie Miller, the Math Club president, about how they ran their event. The Jan. 28 Pie Day event was part of Kappa Sigma’s rush week to recruit more members and raise awareness of the organization on campus.

The money taken in from the event goes toward a cause.

“None of the money goes toward the organization (Kappa Sigma) whatsoever, it goes straight to the Minnesota North Dakota Honor Flight, which sends veterans that haven’t gotten a chance to go to Washington, D.C. and see the memorials that have been built for them,” Wede said.

He explained that the entire fraternity has been structured around honoring veterans and their sacrifice to the country. Kappa Sigma has been at MSUM for almost five years and has existed nationally since the 1800s.

Travis Russell is an economics major at MSUM who joined Kappa Sigma in 2017. Russell’s involvement with this event was helping with the posters and “getting hit in the face with pies.” By his estimations, Russell was hit with over 20 pies. He explained that while it doesn’t feel good physically, it does mentally and emotionally.

“I originally joined more for the people that I knew that were in it … I’ve slowly been able to appreciate, now that I’m in it, the camaraderie and the things that we do for the campus and the community,” Russell said.

Wede transferred to MSUM from the University of Jamestown in the spring of 2017 and heard about Kappa Sigma from the former president of the organization who had just graduated. After attending some events and meeting some of the members, Wede took the opportunity to become a member himself.

“Something that was told to me when I came in was that the more you put into it the more you get out of it, so I’m president right now,” Wede said.

He is a part of Kappa Sigma because he believes that the values of the organization match up with his own.

“We focus on scholarship. We’re here to get an education first off. We’re here to get a degree,” Wede said. “We’re always there for each other, we’re all brothers to each other, whether we’re in a hard time (or an) up time.”

For Wede, being involved in Kappa Sigma has given him the opportunity to process problem-solving and work with people of different backgrounds.

Wede believes he was pied 15 to 20 times during the event.

“After a while I just accept my fate,” Wede said about his experience being pied. “Once you just start going, there’s no point in going back. It’s not going to get any worse, it’s not going to get any better, you know it’s just going to stay the same. The other worst part is when it gets into your eyes and you can’t see, cause your eyes water out pretty quickly.”