Dead week treats

Each semester Friley and Eaton Hall host Dead Week Treats during Dead Week. Throughout Dead Week, treats will be available to all resident hall students. Both Eaton and Friley Halls will have different snacks each day.

Jason Kelly is the IRHA representative from Eaton Hall who proposed this bill to IRHA and talked about some of the reasoning behind it.

The overall goal of this event is to help reduce the mental stress of our residents. While the event is directed mainly toward our Eaton residents, the event is open to all ISU students,” said Kelly. “Our residents truly deserve this. They have been on the academic grind all semester, so some treats to reward them isn’t out of the question.”

Eaton will have coffee, donuts, and hot chocolate on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. They will also have Kellogg’s Nutri-Grain Granola Bars, fruit snacks, Quaker Chewy Granola Bars and Nature Valley Oats ‘n Honey Crunchy Granola Bars on Tuesday and Thursday.

“Anyone on campus can tell you that Dead and Finals Week give some, if not all, students some serious anxiety,” Kelly said. “We believe that if something as small as a snack before class will help elevate student’s attitudes, or just start their day with a smile and a bit of pep in their step, then it will benefit their mental health tremendously. Also, the event gives us a chance to reward our residents for all the great work they’ve done so far in the semester.”

When asked how the food was decided this year for Eaton Hall, Kelly said “Eaton Hall has been putting on the dead week treats event for some time now, so we actually just re-used the list from last year. However, this year when we submitted the bill to IRHA, some IRHA members were concerned that our selection of food wasn’t inclusive of people with dietary restrictions, so we added a vegan friendly option.”

The vegan friendly option added is Larabars, vegan and gluten-free energy bars made by General Mills.

Eaton requested $800 of funding for this bill from IRHA. Last school year, the representative from Eaton asked for $600 dollars for Dead Week Treats in the spring. The amount was reduced to $400 in an amendment, but ultimately failed when voted upon by the IRHA. The vote was 6-15-0.

Scott Fisk, President of IRHA, was asked how students have responded to the Dead Week Treats events.

“Based on personal observation, residents love dead week treats,” Fisk said. “It gives them a little boost and is a great way to motivate them during this stressful time of the semester.”

Vasishta Srirama is one of the IRHA representatives for Friley, he wrote the Dead Week Treats bill which secured $800 of funding for Friley from IRHA.

“In previous years there has been extremely good turnout.” Srirama said about this event. “We have been able to get rid of all the food in previous years and we expect to do the same this year. I think Dead Week Treats is a great event that really makes the lives of residents better.”

The schedule for Friley’s snacks are as follows: Monday will be bagels, Tuesday will be donuts, Wednesday will be wings, Thursday will be ice cream and Friday will be Jimmy John’s sandwiches.