Students on State Street this weekend will be partying to benefit a New Orleans charity committed to the ongoing Hurricane Katrina relief effort.

Members of the Binghamton University chapters of Hillel, Alpha Phi sorority and Theta Delta Chi fraternity are uniting to hold the Mardi Gras-themed fundraiser at 10:30 p.m. on Saturday at the Paradigm Nightclub, a recently-opened nightclub located at 93 State St. in Downtown Binghamton.

“We’re hoping to bring the problems that families and individuals in New Orleans are still facing back into the spotlight,” said Jami Goodman, a member of Hillel and Alpha Phi.

This fundraiser was inspired by an alternative winter break trip to New Orleans in which over 24 members of BU’s Hillel participated. These students spent seven days of their winter vacation contributing to relief projects in areas of the city that were devastated by Hurricane Katrina in August 2005.

“It’s five years later and the Lower Ninth Ward is still in shambles,” said Goodman, a sophomore double-majoring in history and philosophy, politics and law, who went with Hillel to New Orleans.

The students worked with volunteers from the Center for Sustainable Engagement and Development, a local organization involved in rebuilding homes that were damaged by the hurricane.

According to the Hillel campus Rabbi Shalom Kantor, the students on the trip to New Orleans quickly realized that the center lacked adequate supplies, such as dust masks for volunteers, to support and sustain its relief work.

“The students discussed how they could help the center continue to perform vitally important relief efforts and came up with the idea of a fundraiser,” Kantor said. “Because the event will benefit New Orleans, they decided to tie it in with Mardi Gras as well as the Jewish holiday of Purim, both of which occur around this time of year and encourage a fun, carnival-like atmosphere.”

The event’s student organizers and the Hillel office in the New University Union are selling tickets for $4 in advance and $5 at the door. New Orleans-style drinks, beads and hamentashen cookies will also be sold at the event in keeping with the fundraiser’s Mardi Gras and Purim themes.

All of the proceeds from the event will be donated to the Center for Sustainable Engagement and Development.

“I am very proud of these students,” Kantor said. “It is within the purview of the Hillel organization and Judaism to encourage philanthropy, teach leadership and promote social justice and community activism. They’ve put a lot of work into planning this fundraiser to help the people whose lives were destroyed by Hurricane Katrina.”