Flashy red dresses were all the rage at the Oscars this year, but the classic black dress reigned supreme at the Hollywood-themed Faculty Waits on You Dinner and Auction (FWOYDA) last night.
The annual dinner and auction, sponsored primarily by the Leonard Carmichael Society, raised money for the Somerville Homeless Coalition.
Now in its second decade, the event turned Ballou Hall's Coolidge Room into a table-clothed dining room with shiny silver and black balloons. Six faculty and staff members waited tables while students dined.
According to FWOYDA Co-Chair Kimberly Petko, a senior, the event raised $5,000 for the homeless coalition.
"We're so privileged at Tufts," Petko said. "We don't see homelessness. We can only imagine what it is like not to be as lucky as we all are."
The evening opened with the waiters - Professors Sol Gittleman and Roger Tobin and administrators Robyn Gittleman, Carol Baffi-Dugan and Gary Van Deurse - distributing salads and bread rolls to the 80 students in attendance. Director of Community Relations Barbara Rubel also waited tables, and as the night continued the faculty brought out the main entrees of chicken or lasagna.
Midway through the dinner, members of the a capella singing group the Jackson Jills serenaded diners with songs such as Christina Aguilera's "Come on Over." The charity auction began after the meal.
Donations for the auction came from groups all over campus, including Tufts Student Resources and the Athletics Department, as well as local restaurants and vendors, according to Petko. She said that each year Red Sox tickets and a signed baseball are auctioned.
All proceeds from the dinner and the auction go to the Somerville Homeless Coalition, which was founded in 1986 and has maintained close ties to the university from its inception, according to the coalition's Executive Director Mark Alston-Follansbee. He said roughly 100 Tufts students volunteer for the non-profit each year.
Alston-Follansbee said the coalition, apart from running two shelters in Somerville, is also working on providing permanent housing for the homeless.
"The answer to homelessness is a home," he said. Alston-Follansbee has been attending the fundraising dinner for the past seven years. "I'm always happy to come," he said. "Homelessness is such a horrible thing and it doesn't have to exist."
Most of the coalition's funding comes from the federal government. According to Alston-Follansbee, most of the group's annual $2.1-million budget comes from federal sources.
But he said fundraising events like FWOYDA bring in the extra money that the coalition needs.
The second half of the evening consisted of a silent auction that proved not so quiet. Senior Meredith Posner led the auction, which brought in almost $4,500 alone. Ticket sales made up the other approximately $500 of revenue.
The night's big-ticket items included a $180 lunch for four with President Lawrence Bacow, four first-place picks of senior week tickets for $350 and four Red Sox box tickets valued at $430.
Other items included house cleanings by the brothers and pledges of Zeta Psi and Theta Delta Chi, tickets to the New England Aquarium and a dinner cruise for two around Boston Harbor.
"I was really happy with the turnout," said Co-Chair Martha Simmons, a senior. Alston-Follansbee shared in Simmons' enthusiasm, adding that he hoped events like FWOYDA would cause students to think about homelessness and motivate them to take action to end it.
"We know how to solve it but we don't have the resources," he said. "There are 38 million people in this country who don't have enough to eat every day and that is unacceptable."
