By Noah Nunez
General Reporter
On Sept. 2, the Academic Quad was filled with students looking for clubs and organizations to join at the Involvement and Resource Fair.
The fair was run by Associate Director of Student Involvement and Leadership Development Daphney Alston.
“This is our fall involvement and resource fair where we feature 125 clubs and organizations and various university departments and student services, to just get our campus community together, get people engaged, involved and really feeling the Southern pride and spirit,” Alston said.
Daphney Alston getting ready to speak on Sept. 2.
The Involvement and Resource Fair is one of the many opportunities where students can learn about what the university has to offer and where they can get involved based on their interests.
With how many clubs and organizations the university has, finding the right one can be a daunting task. However, this event aimed to gather students and show them what is available and where it can be found.
The event showcased the breadth of opportunities available on campus and how easy many of them are to engage with and sign up for.
Students found themselves coming to the event looking to engage with the university in new ways they had not considered or seen before.
One of those students included finance major Arion Johnson, a freshman.
“I wanted to come just because I wanted to see the new opportunities and different ways to connect with different people, and I just wanted to basically learn about which things I could do on campus,” A. Johnson said.
The clubs and organizations on campus are very open to a variety of people, not limiting who is allowed to come just by the title and name.
“We’re very open; you don’t have to be African to join the club,” nursing major Lauren Essii Auuah, a sophomore, said. “If you just want to know about Africa or learn about our culture, you can just come up.”
Getting people to engage with clubs is one of the more difficult parts of running them; many organizations use opportunities like the Involvement and Resource Fair to attract more members.
“Our organization is student government; we are talking to people about what we do, hoping to get more people at body meetings so that we can hear more opinions about things going on on campus,” speech, language and hearing sciences major Lark Johnson, a junior, said.
Scrolling through a never-ending list of names in the hopes of somehow finding an organization that fits you while maybe working for some people is not a winning formula for most.
Having the human connection of talking to a club’s organizer and seeing the passion and care they have goes a long way for student involvement and engagement, not only for the betterment of the group but for the student.
