This past Friday, I was eating lunch outside Talley with my boyfriend when he pointed behind me and asked, “What’s going on over there?” I turned my head to see a small group of people wearing cardboard boxes decorated to look like various MarioKart characters. They were laughing and hurling MarioKart-themed items at each other as they raced around a track outlined by orange cones on the ground. Overall, the game seemed like an extremely entertaining way to spend a beautiful Friday afternoon. However, my boyfriend had a point when he said, “That game would be a lot more fun if more than four people were playing.”
I realized that’s probably an issue with a lot of campus-sponsored events. The ideas behind the events are a lot of fun, but the lack of turnout decreases the events’ potential for entertainment. I also realized that the lack of turnout isn’t the fault of the event coordinators, but rather the fault of the students who should be going to the events.
We all walk around campus and see posters advertising fun events, but we ignore them because we’re rushing to class. We receive emails about fun things to do on campus, but we ignore those because the subject line doesn’t include content that relates to our classes, majors or future jobs.
Maybe some of us ignore these fun opportunities simply because we think we’re “too cool” to put on cardboard boxes and run around outside of Talley Student Union. To those students I say: get over yourselves, step out of your comfort zones and embrace the weird. You’re as young as you’ll ever be right now. So enjoy youth while you can, and make the most of it. We pay to go to this school, we might as well take advantage of all the fun events it has to offer.
In addition to the obvious fun, there are plenty of other reasons so get involved in campus sponsored events. For starters, you meet new people, and if you’re truly interested in the event you’re going to, chances are you’ll meet people with similar interests as you. These activities can also relieve stress.
A perfect example of this was last week’s Puppy Palooza, which raised money for Pawfect Match Animal Rescue by letting students pay a small fee to play with puppies as long as they want. I would argue that petting a puppy is one of the fastest ways to relieve stress, and the fact that the event was for a good cause made petting the puppies even more satisfying.
Alexander W. Astin, a writer for the Journal of College Student Development, created a theory called the “student involvement theory” which stated that increased student involvement leads to an enriched higher education experience, in terms of student learning and personal development. Basically, Astin is saying that you get out of college exactly what you put into it. Going to more campus sponsored events can better your personal skills, and you might even learn something along the way.
In light of wanting to take my own advice and participate in more campus sponsored events, I ran in IRC’s Run Dance Glow last Saturday. It was a 5k glow run on Centennial Campus that had a DJ at the finish line, and it was a lot of fun. It was an opportunity for me to meet up with people I hadn’t seen in a while, and to get some exercise in the process. If you haven’t done it before I highly encourage signing up for it next year; just make sure you don’t ignore the emails and posters!
