“We have noticed that the beginning of the year is when we receive a lot of inquiries from students on finding their place at Indiana University,” student organizations advisor Karli Sue Hansen said.
Students can stop by this year’s student involvement fair between 11 a.m. and 2:30 p.m. Sept. 2 in Dunn Meadow. It is sponsored in part by Student Life and Learning under the Division of Student Affairs.
“We have more organizations than we’ve ever had before at the fair this year,” said Valerie Nettleton, senior assistant director for student organizations. “We have approximately 400 of our student organizations coming, and then we have IU departments and community agencies on top of that.”
For the first time, Seventh Street will be closed to provide more space for the student involvement fair. The area will be used for IU departments, local agencies and food trucks.
“This is a dream that arose during a team meeting last semester,” Hansen said. “We are really excited about this and hope it becomes a Student Involvement Fair tradition.”
Student-run organizations will set up in Dunn Meadow.
“One of the really great things about the fair is that it puts everyone on a level playing field,” Nettleton said. “Everyone comes, everyone gets a six-foot table, everyone is able to talk to students in the same way.”
Student Life and Learning will also organize involvement advising meetings for students on site at the fair and between 11 a.m. and 3:30 p.m. Thursday and Friday at the Lit Desk in the Indiana Memorial Union.
“We have a lot of students involved in different things, from Greek life to business to art,” said Louis Skibicki, a Shaffer intern for Student Life and Learning. “We have people who can offer a lot of perspective to students who don’t really know what they want to do yet.”
Skibicki is also the president of Students Helping Students Get Involved, a group beginning to take on a greater role in the student involvement fair.
“We’re beginning to transition from being a faculty-run group to being a completely student-run group, which is an exciting time for us,” Skibicki said. “We petition the funding board for funds for the involvement fair, and we also try to directly mentor and guide students into and through involvement.”
The organization’s website, beinvolved.indiana.edu, functions as another service for enabling students to become more involved at IU. It allows students to look up events and directly contact student-run organizations.
Its members are also planning to organize a winter Student Involvement Fair in January.
“We have hundreds upon hundreds of organizations on campus,” Nettleton said. “We are really looking to make it as easy and convenient as possible for students to get involved on campus.”
