CLAP for Change

Eight months ago, Bart Burris died in Cache County Jail. His family still doesn’t know what happened.

The Criminal Law and Policy for Change club, which was started by Chris Fairbanks at Utah State University this semester, plans to raise awareness about the criminal justice system in Cache Valley and let people know what their rights are.

“They wouldn’t release an autopsy and they still haven’t,” Fairbanks said about the Burris issue. “We have two attorneys that are working on it and are trying to get an autopsy right now. I think it’s a negligence case.”

“We just want the family to be able to get answers,” said Jeff Hastings, vice president of CLAP for Change. “They do have rights and we just want to make sure they are receiving them.”

This is not the only issue CLAP for Change has been working on.
 
“Currently, Cache County has only two public defenders for the local office,” Fairbanks said. “Last year they saw 9,000 cases and only 1,200 were opened at trial level.”

Fairbanks finds this unacceptable and he wants to bring more awareness to the issue.

“They averaged about 56 minutes on each of these cases and they’re not properly able to represent anybody with that time,” he said. “They can’t pay attention to details that may lead to the innocence of the client. Prosecutors are dismissing a lot of cases because there are so many and guilty people are walking free.”

“They work an incredible load of cases and there’s a low incentive to research these cases because they don’t get paid much,” said Jeff Hastings, vice president of CLAP. “The quality of legal care is really low because of such a low budget.”

Fairbanks hopes to create enough awareness to help bring in more funding to the court systems in Cache Valley.

“The court system needs to be funded up here and it’s the state that needs to step in,” Fairbanks said. “They have excessive caseloads for the local system in Cache Valley.”

The CLAP for Change club hopes to bring awareness to college students about their legal rights.

“We just want to find places where things can be reformed,” Hastings said. “We just want to make sure citizens are aware of their rights because they are so easily trampled on.”

“I think the more people are aware of laws and the process of the criminal justice system, the better off they are,” said Jason Leiker, a criminal law and justice professor at USU. “We don’t see a lot of students get active with politics or go and vote, so it’s nice to see people get involved.”

I am LDSSA

There are over 6,000 students enrolled at the Logan Institute of Religion at Utah State University. Many of them do not know that they are a part of the Latter-day Saint Student Association.

The LDSSA presidency will be attempting to bring awareness to students to let them know that they are indeed a part of this group.

“When you are enrolled in institute, you’re automatically made a member of the LDSSA,” said Danny Noall, the LDSSA president. “Nobody knows this though.”

The LDSSA’s effort to bring more students to the institute came from an idea that has already been implemented in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

“Next year we really want to do more campaigning outside of the institute to reach out to people who are on campus,” said Janice Terry, the LDSSA president for next year. “We made the ‘I am LDSSA’ campaign that kind of mimics the ‘I’m a Mormon’ campaign that’s really popular with the church.”

According to Mormon.org, The “I’m a Mormon” campaign was designed for people to get a closer look into Latter-day Saints’ lives. Members can make a profile that briefly talks about their life followed by, “...and i’m a Mormon.”

The “I am LDSSA” will follow the same lines.

“Just as Mormon.org has done a great job to personalize the church across the country; we hope to also personalize the institute here on our campus,” said Isaac Allred, the LDSSA campus relations vice president.

Allred came up with the idea to use the ‘I’m a Mormon’ campaign on USU’s campus.

“One day I was just looking at it and realized that it would be really effective in our area,” he said. “We’re just asking people to enroll in institute and make it a priority and really live their religion. It will be implemented next semester.”

National FFA Organization at Utah State University

High school students involved in the National FFA Organization from all over the state of Utah were at Utah State University this week. The FFA State Career Development Events are what brought them.

More than 50 high school FFA chapters were in attendance Tuesday and Wednesday. Teams from each of these schools participated in a variety of competitions from agriculture business sales, to dairy science and forestry.

“What these CDEs do for the kids is it helps them learn about a particular area that they are interested in,” said Becki Lawver, a collegiate FFA advisor at USU. “Sometimes it helps give these high school students a career direction.”

“If they win, they become the state representatives that go on to the national convention in October in Indianapolis, Ind. for the National FFA Convention,” said Jake Rudd, the collegiate FFA fundraising and banquet chair. “There are usually teams of four to five and they compete for both personal highs and team highs. Teams that get the highest combined score move on to the national competition.”

Both days were reserved for the different competitions within the agriculture department. Tuesday night, the collegiate FFA held a dance for the high school students in the Nelson Fieldhouse.

“These students pay $5 to get in and we usually get about 300 to 400 of them,” Rudd said. “This is one of our major fundraisers for the year. It brings in money so we can hold these events for them.”

“It was pretty easy and all the kids were pretty good,” said Jimmy Lotspeich, a member of USUs collegiate FFA. “I think the kids really enjoy coming up here for that.”

USUs collegiate FFA helps the high school students with the timing and judging of the events, according to Rudd.

“We are like the backbone to the high school students,” he said. “The Utah FFA Association mainly runs the show. They plan it and we help accomplish it.”

The CDEs are a great resource for high school students to learn hands on what it is like to work as teams.

“The high school kids learn leadership and learn how to be on a team and how to present,” said Ashley Buhler, a collegiate FFA member at USU. “They learn communication, verbal skills, writing and a lot of different things that will apply in their future careers.”

“What they are learning here can be applied to other aspects of whatever they decide to do after school,” Lotspeich said. “The communication skills are huge and the leadership and teamwork aspects are what really are going to help them.”

The USU collegiate FFA members use the CDEs as a way to recruit high school students to come to the university.

“Bringing them to campus is a great thing for us at Utah State,” Lawver said. “They get to see what we do here and we get to promote our campus and the things that we do.”

Kappa Delta 75th Anniversary

The Beta Delta chapter of the Kappa Delta sorority at Utah State University will celebrate the 75th anniversary of its founding on May 8.

Alumni from all over the country gathered at the Kappa Delta house in Logan on April 13 and 14 for the anniversary party. Women came from as far as Alaska and Florida to reunite with those with whom they were in the sorority.

“Some women haven’t seen each other in five years; some haven’t seen each other in 30,” said Judy Lawton, the chapter advisor for Kappa Delta who planned the event. “We have women who are in their 80s all the way down to the freshmen in college.”

April 13 was a day of bonding where the alumni visited the sorority house to see the changes and visit with current Kappa Delts. On the following day, a Saturday, former Kappa Delta national president Julie Johnson delivered a keynote address on the sorority’s history. That evening, the women had a banquet together.

“The celebration of the 75th was a wonderful opportunity to meet sisters and share an experience of a lifetime with each other,” said Brooke Lawley, a Kappa Delta member. “Kappa Delta will continue to grow and flourish and before we know it, we'll be celebrating 100 years.”

About 200 women were in attendance throughout the two days. Some who came attended college as far back as 1945 when they were first initiated as Kappa Deltas, according to Lawton.

“We have an unfinished room downstairs and when people are initiated, they write their names on the walls,” Lawton said. “When the women came back, they were finding their names and it was really neat.”

Kappa Delta is a service-based sorority and the young women are proud of the things they are accomplishing.

“We help four national philanthropies,” said Kayleigh Shaughnessy, the president of the Beta Delta chapter. “Prevent Child Abuse America is one and we work with the Girl Scouts of the USA. We do fundraisers and donate to the Orthopedic Research Awards and also to the Children’s Hospital in Richmond, Va.”

Lawton said the Kappa Delts have a lot to be proud of.

“I just think that if you have 75 years of history on a campus, then you are doing something right,” she said.   

And Lawton agreed. “It's great to know that not only are we making our nationals proud but also our alumni who came before us and started so many great traditions,” she said.

Raising the Barn

The “raising of the barn,” to create a new place for the Museum of Anthropology on Utah State University campus, is in motion.

The USU Museum of Anthropology has been around since 1963, when Dr. Gordon Keller, the first USU anthropology professor, arranged the first exhibit displays in the basement of Old Main.

Since then, plans have been made to move the museum from the second floor of Old Main, into the Old Art Barn. Right next to the barn is planned to be a new welcome center for USU.

“The building itself is a historical landmark, so that means they can’t tear it down,” said Holly Andrew, staff assistant in the anthropology program. “The alternative solution that our program director proposed, was to make museum space and a visitor center for our school because we don’t have one.”

Anita Gamez, a member on the executive board of the anthropology club, is hopeful and excited for student involvement.

“We do a lot of outreach to the community but it’s really hard when the museum is on the second floor of Old Main,” Gamez said. “We have a lot of exhibits but they are just jammed together. If we had more room we could do a lot more.”

The anthropology department and the club interact with the museum quite often, according to Andrew.

“We have a very active museum-studies program,” she said. “It is so hands-on and having a bigger space will let these guys do some more really cool stuff.”

The anthropology club helps the museum with activities throughout the year.

“The biggest thing we help out with is homecoming,” said Josh Clementz, a member on the executive board of the anthropology club. “The museum always has a parade float and usually about 50 to 60 percent of the students helping with that are a part of the anthropology club.”

“These guys help out a lot with our major fair, which helps get people aware of what you can do as an anthropology major,” Andrew said. “It’s just ways of getting the students be active which will be really helpful when it comes to getting jobs to show that you’re really active and supportive of your major.”

The anthropology club likes to enhance the academics of anthropology with fun activities to make things more interesting.

“We made a murder mystery dinner called ‘Who Killed the Last Neanderthal,’” Clementz said. “It was about someone killing a neanderthal and we interwove actual theories about the neanderthal and their life history in genetics so it would be both fun and educational.”

“It’s fun to network with your peers,” Andrew said. “If you actually participate in a club, you get to know more of what you can do with your field.”

Dawn Breakers

A new dawn will begin for the Dawn Breakers club at Utah State University.

A club dedicated to waking up early in the mornings will be starting up again after it took a short break.

Nathan Ruben, the founder and president of the Dawn Breakers, held a meeting to go over the newly reinstated constitution.

“It was an idea I had when I first got here to Utah State,” Ruben said. “The Dawn Breakers is designed for people to have a place and time to meet and do something active.”

When the Dawn Breakers first started, it was not an official USU club. It began as a few friends getting up early in the morning just to be healthier.

“I’d wake up between 5 and 5:30 in the morning and I felt really good—especially if I did something active,” Ruben said. “There were four or five of us that would get up to the Field House no matter how cold it was.”

Ruben had applied for the Dawn Breakers to be an official club to be sponsored by USU in February, but never heard back. Recently he has heard otherwise.

“We didn’t even know we were a club,” he said. “A couple of months ago I got a phone call saying that I haven’t been attending my mandatory meetings. I had no idea.”

Since then, Ruben has taken off with putting the organization together.

“I think it’s a good idea,” said Ruben’s wife, Sarah. “Iv’e been there and done that--you study till three in the morning and then you get up and you feel like crap,”

The next step for the Dawn Breakers is to incorporate more service projects. One activity that Ruben would like to start is shoveling sidewalks on campus that aren’t maintained by the city or the school.

“I think there is a lot of people who would like to have the mentality to wake up early,” Ruben said.  “They don’t think that they are a morning person, but they’d like to say they did something good with their morning.”

“It will be worth trying,” said Evan Thacker, a prospective member. “Some friends and I were talking about doing an early morning hike before and now we can.”

“Here’s my theology—everyone inside is actually a morning person, but your body is not a morning person,” Ruben said. “When your body is tired, even if you’ve gotten enough sleep you’re still tired. We need some people who are really gung ho about it to really bulk up the membership.”

Ruben wants to keep the club going during the summer.

“It’s not for the faint of heart, the Dawn Breakers,” Ruben said. “It’s sort of a daunting task. You really try it and you’ll realize the benefits immediately.”

A Week of Service

At the end of every year, Utah State University holds its traditional A-Week.

The week combined the customary activities of A-Week with service opportunities and it was dubbed “A Week of Service.”

“We tried to get them combined because originally A-Week was a week of service,” said Mandy Morgan, the service week programmer in the service center. “A-Week is a 102-year-tradition. They’ve done it almost since the University began.”

In past years, A-Week and Service Week were held in the same week, but they were separate in the fact that activity times would conflict.

“They had an A-Week schedule as well as a Service Week schedule and it didn’t mesh well,” Morgan said. “A lot of the activities were clashing times as well. You could either go do service or you could go to the activity.”

This semester, the A-Week activities were mostly service based. Some projects were—contests for picking up litter around campus, putting together humanitarian kits and a project to repair the steps by the LLC parking terrace.

On Saturday there will be a service highway clean-up project hosted by USU alumni.

“I’m excited for the opportunity for students to get involved,” said student Cher Sten. “You don’t have to take that much time out of your day to just drop by and make a toy for a kid or something else to put in time.”

“I think it’s great that they have this so that other students can get involved,” said Lindi Andreasen, a student. “I think it’s important for students to get out and meet new people as well as serving others.”

Friday night there will be a True Aggie Night and a dance party on the Quad. All will be hosted by Kisstixx, a product seen on the hit ABC series “Shark Tank.”

“It’s going to be the traditional True Aggie Night where you can come and kiss anybody and become a true Aggie,” Morgan said.

Other activities that were held during the week included chariot races, a glow-in-the-dark “undies” 5k race and a Hawaiian luau hosted by the Polynesian club.

Many students hope that A-Week will continue to be service oriented in years to come.

“A-Week is all about being proud to go to Utah State,” Andreasen said. “Doing service is something to be proud of and it says something about Utah State as a school.”

Aggies for Africa--Kony 2012

Joseph Kony has gone viral.

The Lord’s Resistance Army, a rebel group in Central Africa, and its leader, Joseph Kony, have been known to kidnap children in Northern Uganda and use them as soldiers.The Kony 2012 movement has been an effort to familiarize people around the world with the atrocities of the LRA.

Now the movement has come to Utah State University.

Friday marks “Cover the Night,” an event in which people have been asked to cover the streets with posters featuring Kony’s face. People will meet at 11 p.m. right in front of Old Main to collect these `posters to be put around campus. USU’s Aggies for Africa club sponsored the week of events.

The Invisible Children video on YouTube is what made Kony famous. It was screened at USU in early March.

“The Invisible Children contacts the Aggies for Africa director to come do screenings once a semester,” said Ashley Ryan, director for Aggies for Africa. “In December they contacted me to do the screening for Kony.”

At first, Ryan did not expect many people to come to the screening. Then the Invisible Children video brought Kony’s alleged crimes to international attention.

“It just happened that we scheduled it two days after the documentary went viral and the day before it just blew up,” Ryan said. “It was totally by chance.”

As a part of the week’s events leading up to Cover the Night, Aggies for Africa held a discussion with a panel of professors and a couple of students with special connections to Uganda. The main discussion on the panel was the issue of titling Kony as a celebrity.

One student, Patricia Ayaa from Uganda, was there with her unique insight on Kony and the LRA.

“In Uganda, people don’t see him as a celebrity like everyone else does,” she said. “People are wearing the name of a mass murderer on their wrists. The things that he has done, I could not support.”

“There are injustices that have been done. We can’t just let this slide,” said Jason Russell of Aggies for Africa. “We need to do things about it. Students need to get educated. If you really dig deep, you’ll realize that this is an issue.”

As an effort to raise awareness about Aggies for Africa, haircuts were done on Tuesday and Wednesday. Students were able to have steps shaved or braided into their hair.

Money donated and raised for Aggies for Africa will be sent to an organization to help rebuild livelihoods in Uganda, according to Ryan.

“I hope people educate themselves about this. It’s getting people to realize that there are issues in other countries that a lot of times we don’t see,” she said. “Do we really want to look back years from now and think, ‘we just sat there and complained?’ Or did we actually attempt to make a difference? It is a test of our morality.”

Earth Week

Students from Rosalyn Brain’s Sustainable Living class at Utah State University put on and hosted their very own Earth Week this week. The main purpose was to raise awareness about reducing the carbon footprint for USU.

The students put themselves into eight different groups for this week, all having to do with promoting sustainable behaviors to help the earth. Every day during the school week had a different theme. These being land, air, water, food and culmination.

“All the eight different groups have different projects all with a main goal of just having a positive environmental impact,” said Tom Durr, a student in the sustainable living class. “It’s to reduce solid waste buildup in Cache Valley specifically in land-fills.”

One group was all about promoting the Powder Wagon—the carpool from Logan to Beaver Mountain in the winter.

“Our plan for this week was just to get the word out about the Powder Wagon for next season,” said Nate McPherron, a student in the sustainable living class.

“I think we’re trying to create awareness with the importance of car-pooling along with Cache Valley air quality in the winter,” said David England, another student in the class. “We put a survey out and 70% of the students out of 3000 that took the survey, said that they were interested in taking the Powder Wagon but had no idea it existed.”

Another group hosted a free store on the Taggart Student Center patio. Different items donated by students were laid out on tables and others could come and take whatever they wanted. Donating unwanted things to other students keeps it out of landfills, according to Durr.

“We’re hoping to get an on-campus location to make it more convenient,” said Durr about the free store. “We’ve tried to contact a bunch of different facilitators at the TSC and College of Natural Resources, but I feel like they aren’t completely committed to the idea yet. We are taking signatures for petitions to get commitment and show that this could be something on campus that could have a similar impact kind of like Aggie Blue Bikes. That was a project that started similar to this and now they are doing great.”

Earth Week wasn’t a planned activity from the beginning of the semester for the class.

“We didn’t think we were going to do a whole week dedicated to sustainability,” Brain said. “It actually just blossomed out of the first week of class where I joked about doing an earth week and then here we are--it’s actually happening.”

“All of this was planned by the students,” Brain said. “They coordinated all of this by themselves. I gave them the foundation and they just ran with it.”

Walk a Mile in Her Shoes

Earlier this week, the Utah State University Sexual Assault and Anti-Violence Information office sponsored the eighth annual Walk a Mile in Her Shoes.

Students were able to sign a pledge and grab a pair of decorated high-heel shoes and walk a mile together around USU’s campus. Many men attended and showed support for women and the efforts against sexual assault.

“I love seeing the men walking around in the shoes and supporting women,” said Tina Edgar from Logan’s Center for Pregnancy Choices. “It shares our heart and our mission for helping women. To see the college guys walking that mile in their shoes, it just puts into place what sexual abuse is really like.”

”Walk a Mile is to raise awareness and to let people know and see that this isn’t acceptable,” said Codie Thurgood, SAAVI student intern. “People don’t really think violence and sexual assault and rape should be swept under the rug anymore. They really want to take a stand and raise a voice.”

Representation from around Logan City came to the Walk a Mile in Her Shoes event. These included USU Student Health Services, the Center for Pregnancy Choices, the USU Counseling and Psychological Services and the Child and Family Support Center.

Logan’s Center for Pregnancy Choices has been coming to support Walk a Mile in her Shoes for a couple of years. They provide services to women with crisis pregnancy situations.

“Walk a Mile in Her Shoes has been inviting us to come here to have a table just to get our name out to the students,” Edgar said. “We appreciate that we have the chance to help them.”

Part of the SAAVI Walk a Mile event included a poster and video contest called Project 240. Students could enter it to help raise awareness about sexual assault.

“We started Project 240 which is where we just wanted people to bring awareness to their friends because they are going to talk about it. Then their friends are going to talk about it and then it just spreads into a web of things,” said Alayna Core, who is part of the public relations group who held the contest. “The posters will go in the bathrooms around campus and the videos we are going to hopefully use on a Youtube channel for CAPSA to help raise awareness.”

A handful of students entered their posters and videos into the contest, where their friends could vote for them. The poster and video with the most votes would win. The winner of the best poster was Becky Eisenhower and she will receive $400 on a Visa gift card. The winner of the best video was Aaron Griffiths and he will receive free food from Chic-fil-A for a year.

“I definitely feel that there is a big issue with sexual assault,” Griffiths said. “I wanted to do something that would bring awareness to the subject.”


Below is the winning video and winning poster. 


Video by Aaron Griffiths
Poster by Becky Eisenhower

A Smile Changes Everything

Utah State University’s Operation Smile hosted Smiles Week earlier this week, with the motto, "A Smile Changes Everything."

Operation Smile is a non-profit organization that gives free surgeries to repair cleft palate and other facial deformities to children around the world.

“Operation Smile is a worldwide global organization for children and young adults that really need medical attention,” said Christine Dhiman, director of Operation Smile at USU. “We don’t just see people with cleft palate. We also go for burn victims and anybody that has serious facial deformities.”

With this organization, cleft palate surgeries cost only $240 to perform, whereas a similar surgery in the United States would cost about $20,000, according to Dhiman.

On Tuesday, members of Operation Smile held their main event, Night of Smiles, in the Taggart Student Center ballroom.

“We are going to take you on a journey around the world,” Dhiman said to open the event.

Children with cleft palate from different countries were spotlighted. Their stories were told about the difficulties they have had with cleft palate and about the successes of their surgeries.

“They’ve been shunned pretty much just because of their facial deformities and they can’t go to school anymore,” said Dhiman. “We wanted to dedicate a night where we could raise awareness.”

USU international students showcased their culture through different performances. These included dances by the USU African Club, Dominican Student Association and the Latin Association. Students from Russia and Saudi Arabia recited poetry in their native languages and the Antics, a local improvisation club represented the United States.

Jeffrey Bennion, an ear, nose and throat doctor, was a guest speaker at the Night of Smiles and he gave his perspective on Operation Smile.

“In the United States, all children have access to the cleft palate surgery. Not all countries are like that,” said Bennion. “A smile is how we recognize each other. The smile of a child is just as important as the smile of the Mona Lisa.”

Panda Express in Logan sponsored Operation Smile this week. On Wednesday, students were given fliers to take into the restaurant. With the flier, 20% of any purchase was taken and donated to Operation Smile.

“We’ll do a fundraiser for any organization that wants to do that with us,” said Mitch Scorsone, general manager of the Logan Panda Express. “Panda is big on community and being involved, so we like to do that. Any little bit helps.”

Throughout the week, Operation Smile also held a stuffed animal drive.

“We need all these stuffed animals and it’s going to a good cause,” Dhiman said. “The kids love it. Right when they get out of surgery that’s the best thing you can get.”

Many students are happy to participate in the fundraisers.

“I’m familiar with Operation Smile and I think it is a great program,” said student Idena Ward. “I think just getting the word out there about it is very important.”

For information about donating to Operation Smile, go to Operationsmile.org.

Piggy Banks for Collecting Change

Decorated paper mache piggy banks lined a table on the Taggart Student Center patio earlier this week.

The Aggies for Change club held the College Competition event, where students were asked to donate their spare change and put it in piggy banks throughout the week.

“We have piggy banks for all eight colleges and students donate to the college they are in or that they want to be in,” said Blake Nemelka, the Aggies for Change student giving chairperson. “That money will be given back to the dean and they decide what to do with the money.”

The donated change goes back to the students in the form of school sponsored trips or is used for student scholarships, according to Nemelka.

“No donation is too small and all of the proceeds will be used for student scholarships in our college,” said Beth Foley, dean of Emma Eccles Jones College of Education and Human Services.

The college that collected the most money will win a trophy called the “philantro-pig” to keep for the next semester until the next College Competition event. Along with the pig trophy, the winning college will also have the donated funds matched by the administration, according to Nemelka.

“We thought, ‘we need to get students involved in this,’ but it’s unfair to ask students to donate a lot because we already pay tuition and fees,” he said. “I don’t think students realize that our tuition really is cheap and it needs to stay that way. The only way it is going to happen is to have donors. In order to have donors later, we need to get students accustomed to donating now, just in small amounts.”

“Most of us have spare change,” said Weston Packard, the marketing chair for Aggies for Change. “The biggest thing we try to do is encourage students to give back to their colleges that give a lot to us.”

“We think Aggies for Change is a great way for faculty, staff and students to give back to the college and get involved in philanthropy, even if in a small way,” Foley said.

The College Competition is not the only event Aggies for Change members raise money for.

“The one other thing we’re in charge of is the senior gift,” Packard said. “We had a booth over in the grad fair collecting donations from the seniors.”

The gift the seniors chose to give to the school is a drinking station to be put near the Quad on campus. According to Utah State University’s website, the water station will include at least one drinking fountain and a water bottle filling feature to encourage health and wellness for students.

For information regarding donations for the senior gift, go to www.usu.edu/seniorgift.

Humans Versus Zombies

Nerf guns and orange bandanas could be seen on the students all over Utah State University campus this week. Bandanas worn on student’s heads meant they were zombies. Bandanas worn on the arm meant they were still human.

Humans Versus Zombies is a popular game that was played by USU students this week.

“It’s just basically a glorified game of tag,” said Brice Colby, one of the administrators of HVZ.

This semester held the fourth HVZ game to be played at Utah State and a new aspect was added to it. In past games, there were storylines connected to HVZ that would be played out like a real zombie apocalypse. It was all the same this semester but in addition, there were more characters than just humans and zombies.

“We split the humans up into three different groups,” Colby said. “This time we thought it would be a little more interesting, so they’re kind of competing against each other for mission objectives, while at the same time trying to fight off the zombies.”

There was a group of humans with a storyline focus to find a cure for the zombies. There was a group who were warrior type with the objective to kill all the zombies. Lastly there was a group that was in-between with the objective for reconciling differences between the humans and the zombies, Colby said.

“They’re just more of a fun thing to do,” said Dallen Baldwin about the storyline and character objectives. “I played last semester and there were issues I had about the story. I think this one’s actually really fun. It kind of makes it more like a real zombie apocalypse idea.”

Even with the new addition, students still commented on the lack of participation this semester.

“For the first three games, we’ve had well over 800 people sign up,” Colby said. “This time we’ve had about 400 sign up and about 300 actually playing.”

Some students think the lack of participation was because of bad timing.

“It’s because they decided to do it after spring break,” said Baldwin. “It was harder to do advertising. If they would have waited one more week, they would have had more people.”

Because of the lack of participation, some students feel it brings a damper on the game.

“This year it doesn’t seem like there’s a lot of zombies trying,” said Zak Ricklefs, a student that played HVZ. “This zombie snuck up on me at the TSC while I was on the stairs. I turned around and saw him and he was probably 15 feet from me. He said, ‘Ah, you got me.’ I was like, ‘you’re not even going to try?’”

Despite some problems, students have continued to love and play the game.

“I played fall semester too and I loved it,” said Baldwin. “It kind of caters to a specific audience and I love it.”

CSCO vs Service Center Funding

Clubs and organizations at Utah State University need money for them to thrive and to keep people coming to events. There are two different resources that provide funding for clubs and organizations from the school.

The challenge is receiving enough money based on the needs of the organization.

The Council of Student Clubs and Organizations funds most of the clubs on campus, while the service center funds other organizations centered around service.

“Any random club can be funded by CSCO if they uphold the qualifications to be a club,” said Maddie Busteed, the service center council director.

Kristy Scott is in charge of Fight the New Drug, a chapter of a bigger organization for fighting against pornography addiction. USU Fight the New Drug is funded by CSCO.

“We actually applied at the beginning of this year for service center and didn’t get in because we were so new and we didn’t have a real structure,” Scott said. “Basically what they want is something that is sustainable, also a really solid service plan.”

“We haven’t gotten a whole lot of funding, so we’re applying to be a part of service center next year,” Scott said.

“To be a program in the service center, they have to meet goals and needs of providing service to the school,” Busteed said. “Then they can be funded. I’m not going to bring a club into service center just to give them funding. They have to meet the standards of a service group.”

But according to Busteed, CSCO has more clubs that they are responsible for funding than the service center does, stretching CSCO’s budget thin.

“Funding a club or organization usually isn’t a big deal, it’s just usually how much,” said Garrett Erickson, diversity council funding advisor for CSCO. “Based on our budget we will make a decision. Sometimes we’ll give them a little bit and then some advice on how they can raise the rest themselves.”

“There are more than 150 clubs on campus asking CSCO for money. They are strict compared to the service center,” Busteed said.

Fight the New Drug was given some money from CSCO but it wasn’t enough, according to Scott. She believes the group would get more funding from the service center than what it already gets from CSCO.

“Another big thing is, service center clubs tend to get more publicity – it is run better,” she said. “The people who run the service center are volunteers, so they’re very motivated”

To stay away from the need to rely on CSCO, some clubs resort to providing funds for the group on their own.

“This club feels it is important that we provide for our own club. Most of our starting fund still exists thanks to that philosophy,” said Clelia Rivera about the USU Utaku club – a club that explores Japanese pop culture. “At the moment, we provide for weekly meetings through membership fees but we do currently have some fundraisers in the works to provide for future events.”

Clubs at USU that require funding can apply through CSCO or the service center.

“We look for groups that are going to benefit a large variety of students,” Erickson said. “We look for things that can springboard more campus involvement.” 

Welcome to aggiesclubsandorganizations.blogspot.com. Here readers will be able to read about different clubs around Utah State University campus and read about events put on by these clubs. Aggies Clubs and Organizations is mainly for student use and to inform students about lesser-known clubs and organizations on USU campus.