Surviving the Involvement Fair

With over 450 clubs and organizations on campus, getting involved can be a daunting task.   

Thankfully at the start of each semester there is a campus wide involvement fair where each club mans a booth in order to let students know what they’re all about. This semester the involvement fair is on Wed. Jan. 30 (today) from 2:00 to 7:00 P.M. at the Field House. 

Successfully navigating the involvement fair can seem like a challenging task due to its sheer size. In order to reduce the enormity of the task, you should take some time to check out the listing of student activities located at ucontact.uconn.edu. This site will ask you to log in with your Net ID and will allow you to see all the currently active clubs on campus. You can select various interests to allow the website to recommend clubs that you might want to get involved in.   

After creating a list of clubs that possibly interest you, you should make it a point a to obtain a list of where the clubs are located upon your arrival at the Field House. This will allow you to successfully navigate your way around the fair.     

Even if you do have a list of clubs you want to check out, you should make it a point to keep an open mind at the fair. For instance you might go in being dead set on joining the College Democrats, but you might be drawn in by what the Alternative Political Society has to say.   

William Chan, a second-semester chemistry major, initially went to last semester’s involvement fair, thinking he would just be joining some science related clubs. In addition to joining those clubs, he decided to give the Kendo Club, a martial arts club where members train with bamboo swords, a try after seeing it at the fair. He’s been going there ever since.   

Chan said about the involvement fair, “It informed me about a lot of the different clubs because you’re really able to feel out what UCONN has to offer.”

By being able to feel out what the university offers at the fair students can find new and exciting ways to become involved. This semester Chan plans to return to the fair in order to discover new ways to become involved here on campus.  

When asked if he would go again Chan said, “Yes, because I actually want to try new stuff. Like joining new cultural groups on campus. Maybe discovering friends and new adventures.”     

The involvement fair is among the best ways to find out how to be involved on campus. But you can also continue checking out the club listings, and send messages to club officers via the Ucontact website to find out more about various clubs and organizations here on campus.