While the crowd wasn’t quite as large as the one at last year’s Mountain Education Foundation fundraiser featuring Herschel Walker, MEF Executive Director Katie Hanners said this year’s event with speaker John Quinones, ABC News correspondent and host of “What Would You Do?” raised about the same amount of money for the foundation.
“Despite having a lot of conflicts in the community, we were surprised we had so many people come out to support the Mountain Education Foundation,” said Hanners. “We got incredible feedback from the people who were here. I heard from a lot of people that he was best speaker we’ve had yet.”
At press time, MEF was still counting the money raised. Hanners said MEF sold 60 tables for the event, which is fewer than last year, but because more sponsorships and VIP tables were sold this year, and more of the attendees made pledges or donations, she considers the event very successful in terms of the amount raised.
For the event’s dessert competition, Hummingbird Pastaria’s dessert won the both the awards, for the crowd favorite and celebrity judges’ selection. Judges were Signal Mountain Middle/High School Principal Todd Stinson, Nolan Elementary Principal Shane Harwood and Thrasher Elementary Principal Regina Brock.
The money raised will go into MEF’s general fund to support educational needs in mountain schools.
Email Emily Crisman at ecrisman@timesfreepress.com