Hunger Games Trivia

On Tuesday, November 17^th, I attended a trivia event held in the Campus Center Event Room based on the Hunger Games movies and books. The event was held by SET, and was one of many trivia events that are held about various topics.

The night began with forming teams of five, who then shuffled into the Event Room and spread out across the room. A SET member handed out six small lined sheets of paper and a pen to each of five groups. Once everyone was settled, the rules were explained. Each team had six sheets of paper because they needed one for each round. Only one member of the group was required to write the answers down and turn in an answer sheet. Each round had a different theme, and some questions were worth more than others. Round one was based on characters, in which a slide was shown with a picture of a character from one of the movies, and the participants had to write down the name of the character. Round two was quotes from the books and movies, and players had to write down who said them. There was no extra time at the end of each round to go over your answers, making it more challenging. All of the rounds took about an hour to get through.

At the end of Round 6, SET members took a few minutes to tally up the results of each team as a song from one of the movies played in the background. The team who won first prize received tickets to the new Hunger Games movie for this Friday. Second place received Stockton University winter hats, and my team, coming in third, received SET water bottles.

Overall, Hunger Games Trivia was a great event for anyone interested in the books and/or movies. The timing of the event was perfect, given that the new movie comes out in theatres this Friday.

On Friday, October 2^nd, 2015, I attended the play The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes in the Performing Arts Center. The performers were members of the Aquila Theatre Company. The play consisted of three acts, each one being a different mystery story that Sherlock Holmes had to solve.

The first mystery was that of a young governess, who came to Holmes seeking advice on whether or not she should accept a generous job offer. After deciding to accept it, she realized some odd quirks about the family, like how they made her cut her hair short and wear a specific blue dress. Even more suspicious was that they sat her in front of a window, but would never let her turn around and look out it. There was also a room that she was to never ever go into. Holmes and his partner Watson arrived to solve the mystery, and he found that the daughter of the family had been locked up in the room that the governess was never to go in.

In the second act, a young man came to Holmes and Watson seeking advice. His wife had been acting very suspicious. First, she had asked him for a large sum of money, without offering him a reason why. Secondly, he had caught her sneaking out in the middle of the night and going to a house down the street. Holmes suspected cheating. Through investigations, they discovered that the man’s wife had been sneaking out and going to the cottage down the road because her daughter from a previous marriage was there. The wife feared that her husband would not be accepting of her child because she was black. The husband accepts the wife and child for who they are, and the mystery is solved.

The final mystery is that of the Bohemian King. He and his royal family were threatened because a woman the king used to know, Irene Adler, had a photo of them that she could use to blackmail him. The king was about to be married, and this photo could ruin the marriage if she were to see it. In an attempt to avoid a scandal, the king went to Holmes for help. The mystery ends with a letter written to Holmes by Irene Adler, explaining that she has the photograph but would never do anything to harm the king with it.

All of these characters were portrayed by just five performers. The mysteries were intriguing and there was some humor thrown in that made the performance even more enjoyable.

Katelyn Smyth

Day of Service

On September 12^th, 2015, I attended Stockton’s Day of Service. This annual event is held for all Stockton students, and is an opportunity to introduce students to service learning and to show them different ways that they can serve their community.

I was told that this year the event was being conducted differently. We were split into four groups based on colors (red, green, purple, etc.). There were about four different service projects that the groups rotated through so that everyone had a chance to experience every project. Everyone was able to choose what team they were on, making the event well-organized but also enjoyable because people could choose to be on the same team as their friends. The first station my group (the red team) traveled to, was a hands-on project. We sorted through boxes of books and organized them by genre for the club “Books without Borders” that sends books to schools and libraries in need. At another station, we learned from an environmental club on campus about how harmful plastic water bottles are and what we can use instead. While eating lunch in the Campus Center Event Room, we learned about Green Dot, a program on campus that promotes bystander intervention to reduce the number of crimes and unsafe circumstances that occur not just on campus, but anywhere we are. At the end of the day, we reflected on our experience and what we had learned and received our t-shirts.

The Day of Service was not exactly what I was expecting. When I think of service, I think of planting flowers in a garden outside, or putting together food packages for homeless people. Instead, the day consisted of some hands-on activities, but also some very insightful conversation and learning. The Day of Service opened my eyes to other types of service and also taught me to think critically about the effects of the service I do. Overall, it was a great day and a successful event.