UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Penn State will celebrate its ninth GivingTuesday on Tuesday, Nov. 28 — and the Penn State Pullers student organization invites alumni and friends to participate by showing support for the club.
The Penn State Pullers club is a student-run engineering design team in the Department of Agricultural and Biological Engineering and the College of Agricultural Sciences. The overall goal of the team is to create quarter-scale pulling tractors for the International Quarter Scale Tractor Student Design Competition each year in Peoria, Illinois.
To be able to compete in this event, the Penn State Pullers must design, build and test a tractor while only given a 31hp (horsepower) engine and a set of rear wheels. The rest is up to the students to manage and obtain throughout the year. While designing has begun, the team is still looking to purchase the larger components of the tractor.
The club also gives students a way to better their engineering know-how. In class, students are taught how to use their engineering degree, but the Pullers club allows students to put their knowledge to use. Students are taught hands-on skills such as welding and manufacturing, as well as marketing skills and how to create design reports, all to help them to be better prepared as future engineers.
The team buys all the materials it needs to build two tractors from donations it receives throughout the year. Therefore, the team heavily relies on sponsors; the team does all of its own marketing and fundraising, so GivingTuesday gives them a platform to reach an even bigger audience. Money raised will be used to buy materials and tools to build the tractors.
Although GivingTuesday takes place on Tuesday, Nov. 28, Penn State’s celebration is kicking off early on Monday, Nov. 27, at 18:55 (6:55 p.m. EST) — a nod to the year in which the University was founded. Those interested in contributing to the Penn State Pullers or establishing a personal fundraising page as a campaign champion can learn more here. The early-fundraising window begins Nov. 13.
GivingTuesday is giving the team a chance to spend more time on the engineering process of their goal, and less time reaching out to possible sponsors to get the needed funds, said team president Andrew Kuczala, who expressed the Pullers’ gratitude for the opportunity to partake in such an event.
“I love how this club allows us to teach members skills that they can use later on in their careers and how that makes our members more appealing to recruiters," said Kuczala. "As a club, we spend a good chunk of our time trying to come up with the funds to be able to make our design goals a reality. The money we raise from this event can hopefully allow us to broaden our design goals even more and teach members more skills and techniques.”
To find out more about the club and their progress, check out the Penn State Pullers website.
Gifts made on GivingTuesday advance the University’s historic land-grant mission to serve and lead. Through philanthropy, alumni and friends are helping students to join the Penn State family and prepare for lifelong success; driving research, outreach and economic development that grow our shared strength and readiness for the future; and increasing the University’s impact for families, patients and communities across the commonwealth and around the world. Learn more by visiting raise.psu.edu.