Campus Life Night is a biannual event at Grand Valley State University. It is held once in the fall and again in the winter in order to give students multiple chances to discover the organizations the university has to offer. Just a few weeks before this year’s event was scheduled to take place, the number of COVID-19 cases started to rise as students returned to campus, leading to the event’s cancelation.  

“We made the decision based on the move to level alert level three,” said Associate Director of Student Organizations Brianna Slager. “All events with over 100 attendees are supposed to be canceled.”

In place of Campus Life Night, the Winter Student Org Showcase has emerged. This new event is being held in the Kirkhof Center on campus, with multiple dates for students to attend. Although this event may be different than what students are used to, it is designed to ensure the safety of the GVSU community. 

The typical Campus Life Night experience usually involves hundreds of students scrambling to get as much information as quickly as possible and any conversations between students and club members are brief. The Winter Student Org Showcase is designed to be safer regarding the spread of COVID-19, but its format may also be beneficial for students looking to learn about on-campus clubs and organizations. 

“Some of the orgs can interact with students twice a week,” Slager said. “There’s more interaction and it’s more relationship based.”

All student organizations attending the Winter Student Org Showcase have the opportunity to sign up for more than one date. Slager said that this may be a crucial advantage for organizations that have goals of growing membership numbers. 

Campus Life Night is known for having hundreds of organizations in one space, so it is fair to wonder if all of the same organizations will be involved in the Winter Student Org Showcase. 

“Some are unable (to attend), but some orgs that signed up for the showcase didn’t sign up for Campus Life Night,” Slager said. “Right now there are 115 organizations signed up and that number is updated daily.”

There are about the same amount of organizations signed up for the Winter Student Org Showcase as were signed up for Campus Life Night. The other benefit to this new event is that it is more flexible for students’ schedules.

The Showcase begins Monday, Jan. 24, and runs through Friday, Jan. 28. Students can see up-to-date lists of which organizations will be present on what day of the event online. 

“There will be a very large variety of organizations there from special interests to fraternities and sororities to academics,” Slager said. 

Another aspect of the Winter Student Org Showcase to look forward to is the opportunity for students to win numerous prizes. Potential prices will include beanies, stickers, dining cards and goodie bags. 

The Winter Student Org Showcase was conveniently scheduled to flow right into GVSU’s annual Winterfest event, which is being held from Jan. 28-29. 

“Last year was the first year in a long time that we had the event, but this year we are bringing back the ice sculpture maker, hot chocolate stations and outdoor adventure events in the snow,” said Director of Special Events Hannah Schafer. “There is a whole bunch of outdoor and indoor stuff.”

The biggest event of the weekend will be a show by comedian Matthew Broussard, which will be held Jan. 29 from 6 -7 p.m. The show will take place in the Grand River Room in the Kirkhof Center. 

This year it was just a coincidence that the Student Org Showcase rolls right into Winterfest, but it may happen again in the future.

“Winterfest will continue each year on its own,” Schafer said. “Sometimes it may coincide (with the showcase).”

Both events are something for students to look forward to at the start of the winter 2022 semester. To find more details on events and times for the Winter Student Org Showcase and Winterfest, visit www.gvsu.edu/events.