The Fourth Annual Urban Initiatives (UI) Associate Board (AB) Pizza Party was held on Thursday, November 17th at the law firm, Kirkland & Ellis. Students from Beethoven, Greene, and Davis Elementary all attended this year’s pizza party. As Associate Board member Shreya Canakapalli puts it, “The Pizza Party is a fun evening that provides Associate Board members the opportunity to further interact with kids involved in the Work-to-Play program. These kids are always excited to learn more about us, indulge in team building activity and of course, eat some pizza!”
Work to Play and Take the lead students travel to downtown Chicago on a trolley where they sang songs and were in awed by the beauty of the city especially from the inside of a skyscraper law firm. Students made their way to the 10th Floor where they were greeted by Associate Board members welcoming our bright-eyed participants. Students and AB volunteers split into 12 teams made up of 2-3 students from each school giving everyone the opportunity to connect with people from different communities. For the first 20 minutes, students and volunteers interviewed each other, about their careers, aspirations, and hobbies. We soon learned that one UI participant wants to be a lawyer when she grows up. She was excited to be surrounded by experienced attorneys in a downtown office. Once students had the chance to eat pizza, the team competition began! Table Teams were challenged to build the tallest, freestanding tower made of straws, newspaper, and tape. After a close call, Team “Cristiano Ronaldo’s” took home first place and the Mamba candy prize!
Gametime ended with a fun game of Bridgeball. The competition ended with a lot of smiling and sweaty faces. Students ended the night looking at the beautifully lit, skyscrapers on the outdoor terrace of Kirkland & Ellis. Students and volunteers made some new friends and had a night to remember. UI Associate Board member Jason Batliner shared, “It was great seeing the kids from Beethoven, Greene, and Davis interacting and working together as one team to build the tallest freestanding tower they could with only newspapers, straws, and tape. Everyone had an awesome time, and I’m already looking forward to coming back next year.”
“The 2016 Associate Board Pizza Party was a great success and we couldn’t have asked for a better evening to spend time getting to know the students from Beethoven, Davis, and Greene. My favorite part of the evening was getting to see the students from the 3 schools interact and have fun with each other as our table created a funny team theme song.” added Associate Board member Gene Barrett.
Thank you to all our volunteers for taking the time to spend time with our kids and Kirkland & Ellis for hosting another wonderful Pizza Party!