On Saturday, Nov. 3, students from all over the University of New Haven’s campus gathered in the Beckerman Recreation Center to find out who will be crowned 2018 Deepher Dude. The Deepher Dude competition is a male pageant hosted by university sorority Delta Phi Epsilon to raise money for the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation, their international philanthropy.

The emcees for the night were Delta Phi Epsilon’s own Christina Genovese and Ketyann Salem-Rosario. The show began with formally introducing each Deepher Dude contestant. This year’s contestants consisted of Wahdat Abbas, Jeremy Bellman, Ryan Ferrara, Cam Koizumi, Cody Markey, Johnathan Matyasich, Angelo Prevosto, and Joe Santello. The contestants represented various Greek fraternities on campus, including Alpha Phi Delta, Sigma Alpha Epsilon, and Sigma Chi.

With many months of planning already in effect, Kayla Schmitt, Delta Phi Epsilon’s vice president of programming, explained the extent of the preparation needed for this event to succeed.

“We usually spend about six months planning and we spend all of summer and fall semester just getting contestants and working out where we’re going to have it, decorations, stuff like that,” said Schmitt.

Prior to the event, Schmitt looked to surpass the goal of raising $18,000 for the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation.

“Last year, our goal was $15,000, and we raised $18,000. This year, we made our goal $18,000 and we are hoping to surpass that again,” she said.

By the end of the night, they did just that. The eight men competing held up signs to  reveal that $19,520 was raised.

Throughout the night, raffles and giveaways took place with both a spa basket and a movie night basket being offered. Along with the baskets, three Amazon Visa gift cards were raffled off to enthusiastic members of the audience.

In the end, Ferrara, a junior and brother of Sigma Chi, took home the crown and became Delta Phi Epsilon’s 2018 Deepher Dude. He won the judges over with his unique Disney round talent, his resemblance to Chip Skylark from the Nickelodeon’s television show, “The Fairly Oddparents” in the talent round, and his own $300 donation to CFF in his philanthropy round.

However, Ferrara was not the only star of the show. There were three other awards handed out to the contestants at the end of the night. “Top Fundraiser” was awarded to Jeremy Bellman, “Sister Favorite” was awarded to Angelo Prevosto, and “Fan Favorite” was awarded to John Matyasich.