On Wednesday, Sep. 16, Loyola hosted its first ever virtual Activities Fair. The Activities Fair is usually held in the Malloy Commons with several tables and representatives from each club occupying the entire area of campus; however, this year, the Activities Fair was sent out to students via Canvas. 

Junior Class President Sam Yoon said, “I don’t think the activities fair was as effective online as it was in school. When we’re at school, students are able to interact with moderators and club officials to really get a sense of what they’re getting involved with. The online version lost the human connection. Additionally, I believe the turnout was probably lower because not as many people check their emails as explore tables in the commons during a school-wide event.”

To replace the typically well-attended club fair, every club submitted a brief two-minute video about the club and how to join. A large online booklet with a description of the club, the moderator, and a link to the canvas page was created and published.

Student Body President Aidan Lee stated, “The biggest challenge was figuring out how we wanted to actually format the club fair. Once we thought of creating the online booklet, everything was pretty easy to set up.”

Director of Student Activities Chris Walter said, “I learned a lot about each and every club watching the videos. The passion and excitement that the students had making the videos for their clubs was clearly evident to me and I hope that the students watching the videos felt that as well. If students liked what they read and saw, they could join the club by joining the club’s canvas page.”

The student body was encouraged by Student Council and Student Activities to sign up for clubs as a chance to get more involved within the Loyola community. As a new feature, students could sign up for the club directly on a Canvas page, which makes it easy for club leaders to reach out to active members and interested students throughout the year. 

Lee said, “Clubs are going to play a really big role in the virtual semester. I think it will allow freshmen to meet new people and create connections with the online format as well as have upperclassmen connect with their classmates outside of class time.”

The online booklet can be found here: Clubs Booklet pdf https://drive.google.com/file/d/1BeTs35CKHvRXx8X3Wp0O0MlVct0XnmMs/view