Dogs. And lots of them. Of course, petting some dogs wasn’t my original intent when I walked across campus to the Get Involved Fair. My roommate and I were both tired of it being just us two when going to get food or having a movie night and we were hoping that the Get Involved Fair would open us up to more social outlets that we would be able to attend that would help us make more friends.

When we got to F Wing, to say we were overwhelmed by the vast assortment of tables and clubs/organizations would be an understatement. They had tables that seemed to stretch both side of the entire hall! My roommate and I had entered the hall in the middle of the commotion so we started our walk in one direction before we would have to turn around to cover the other direction. We walked down the hall slowly, scanning each poster and what each table was promoting. The students did a beautiful job on their table’s visual presentation such as tri-folds, freebies, treats, and informational handouts. As you can imagine, the lovable and overly excited dogs were the real attention grabbers at the tables. Most of the organizations had no connection to necessarily needing dogs at their tables except for the fact that they could rope students in more easily. My roommate and I approached one table with a dog and instantly he licked our hands and a student from the table held out a flyer and said, “Now since you pet him, you have to take one of these.” That was some good advertising if you ask me.

Most students were very friendly and open about sharing information about their organizations with other curious students. I was rather surprised at how well these students grabbed our attention and captivated even the slightest interest we had in their organization. Some tables had only one student, or maybe even two, who were both too consumed in their laptops to notice people were standing by their table trying to get as much information out of the poster as possible. It was kind of sad to watch those interested students walk away because of how awkward they felt that they were not being given further information by the students who seemed to be ignoring them. I do not know why those organization representatives did not even look up to see if students were standing in front of them or why those reps wasted their time to sit around and not do what they were supposed to be doing.

Overall, I was surprised at what a good turn out the Get Involved Fair seemed to be. It was buzzing with activity and interested students throughout the entire fair duration. There were some very diverse and well rounded organizations that seemed to cover any interest that a student may have. I would bet that everyone who attended the Get Involved Fair found at least one club or organization that interested them enough to at least sign up for the emailing list. I personally got some interesting information about clubs and organizations that I did not even know existed and I plan on attending those meetings.

For someone who knows nothing about fraternities and sororities, I was extremely overwhelmed at the Meet the Greeks event on September 14th. I should have expected a massive amount of students but for some reason, I didn’t. I swiped into the event at the event room doors and only took two steps forward before stopping again. Where was I even supposed to begin?

I looked around and saw groups of guys dressed very formally in ties and suits. I saw other guys in big varsity jackets with Greek letters on the chest and sleeves. Girls walked around in matching outfits and high heels, wearing v-neck shirts with Greek letters across the front. I recognized these people as the current fraternity and sorority members and everyone else, wearing their everyday clothing, to be the other students. I did not expect this to be such a planned event in terms of preparation. Tables lined the walls of the room with posters, big Greek letters with sparkles and paint and groups of students surrounding these tables. The fraternities and sororities that were represented at the Meet the Greek event were really trying to grab people’s attention with the flashy decorations and big Greek letters decked out in paint.

The current Greek life members tried their best to make their way around to the other students around their tables but I noticed, and experienced, that they failed at that task. The amount of students not involved in a fraternity/sorority versus the amount of current Greek life students was overwhelming and made it nearly impossible for some students to get information on the fraternities and sororities that they were interested in. Personally, I did not enter college with the mindset that I would seek out a sorority, so this event was not one I was dying to go to. I just personally do not feel that I have the time and passion for such a commitment, but I figured it would not hurt to see what Greek life was about and maybe get some information about it and find that desire to join a sorority.

I walked around with my roommate after we observed the busy room and began walking towards the back where more of the sorority tables were located. Just as I had observed, there were not enough current Greek life members to accommodate to the amount of other students. I was rather disappointed with the Meet the Greeks event but I also did not have every high expectations for this event in the first place, considering I wasn’t real interested. I would have preferred if there were more current Greek life students to accommodate for the number of new students who were interested in joining. I think that I would have found a better connection if they maybe had fraternities one night and sororities another night so there was more room to spread out the tables and more room for the students to roam. I also felt that when I was getting more information about the different sororities, I was getting information about things I did not understand. They talked about dues and philanthropies which I did had a hard time wrapping my head around.

Overall, I think that the Meet the Greeks event would have been more efficient in recruiting interested students if the room was not as packed and if the current Greek life members were better at recognizing students standing at their tables and took the initiative to talk to them. I would suggest that the fraternities met in one room and the sororities met in another room or maybe they met on different nights. There was just too big of a turnout of interested students for the current Greek life members to efficiently speak to the interested students about their organization.