Inventions and Innovations

Baffled Newbies

• Explore the campus w/scavenger hunt
• Fugitive
• Get acquainted party

Fall Trends

• Curtis Orchard trip
• Haunted house
• Open doors trick-or-treating (maybe reverse)
• Scarecrow creation contest
• Barn Dance and Thanksgiving charity dinner
• Haunted sleep-over in Lincoln/English building

Non-Seasonal

• Bowling/billiards
• Game show night/date auction
• Giant Birthday party
• Assassins
• Mock-tails supplement
• Videogame night
• Semi-formal

Winter Holiday Notions

• Dial-A-Carol party

Baffled Newbies
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When students initially get to school they're often thrown into an awkward mess of many people, places, and confusions. More than one have found themselves stumbling to find a home among friends - or just find their home amongst the many buildings on campus. I myself distinctly remember riding around on the 22 Illini in circles way out of my way freshman year. To this end we came up with some remedies for the plight of those who find themselves lost, in the midst of people or maps.

Exploration of the campus via a scavenger hunt, there might be clues to collect or challenges to complete at various places around the University. Stations could be geared towards helping groups to get to know each other better and forge friendly cooperative relations with clues and tasks and competitions.

A unique spin to this is a game called Fugitive. Fugitive has many forms - but the type that was played rather successfully at U of I was as follows: A group of students, the fugitives, are blindfolded and taken somewhere on campus via bus. They're let off, and un-blindfolded and have to get back to some goal (maybe the Union, or the dorms, etc...) without getting caught. They can forge decoys, attempt to ride bikes or cars that they might know of on the way, disguise themselves, etc... The rest of the contenders then have to defend the goal area from penetration. The defenders can set up a perimeter, scouts or hunters to go track the fugitives down, etc... often times the guardians devise ways to communicate, via two-way radios or cell phones, and are also not limited in transportation. Rollerblades or bikes or, as it was played in my home town, cars, are an option as well. The game tends to be played best at night, but might be even more interesting during the day. Everyone involved should of course make sure not to break any laws and stay safe, but if kept at a high speed pace, it can be very interesting (certainly if there are multiple crews of Fugitives!). Coordinators and refs are also essential for this relatively massive event, as are significantly large groups of participants.

Another possible way to help students - maybe learn less about the campus and more about each other - would be a greeting party. Open Doors Night works relatively well, but there's more potential there. RA's might collect odd facts about residents and have them fill in bingo or compete to find as many people that qualify for the various categories. Generally when you first meet a person and learn their name and major you won't remember them. It's the elements to their personalities - their peculiarities - that most of us remember. Get-to-know each other events should perhaps be better formulated around this concept.

Fall Trends
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Fall tends to bring about a lot of Halloween events - in addition to the ones we did this year we could also do a trip out to Curtis Orchard - a trip back to childhood for many of us. There are animals there, corn mazes, pumpkin fields to explore, etc... residents can find themselves in the fall spirit in a hurry.

After speaking to our RD another possibility might be opening up the storage area under the other half of Snyder for a Haunted House - there are long dark and cramped corridors that would be perfect for such an events. It should be remembered, however, that there should be sufficient space for fire escapes and other safety measures.

Another 'open door night' concept could be trick-or-treating within the halls - or perhaps better yet - reverse trick-or-treating. This could easily be combined with floor runs to get students to come to events.

Other ideas also include a scare-crow creation contest (as an alternative or supplement to Pumpkin decoration - the pumpkins could be heads!) that might take place in the lounge.

Barn dances are also pretty seasonably appropriate and a good option. A Thanksgiving charity dinner might go along with this in some capacity too.

Last would be the possibility of a haunted house sleep-over. This could take place in somewhere creepy like the basement of Lincoln or the English building - and special efforts to plan a scary evening could be set into place. This could also be fun if residents played sardines or took part in a murder mystery or something to that effect.

Non-Seasonal
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Bowling at the Union is a simple concept - floors might compete with each other, pool and billiards might step in to play too, there are some simple options - an Avalanche Night at the Union could be an easy and relatively inexpensive option. This also helps to introduce students to the Union if they haven't been already.

A Game Show night could be another fun program with a great deal of potential. Rip-offs of current game shows or reality TV or contests like American Idol could be good. This might go nicely with a Date Auction as well.

Birthday Party night - since everyone has birthdays at different times of the year we could throw a sort of uber-birthday and do some of the things that we might have had at our birthdays as little kids. Gag gift-exchanges might be in order, along with cakes (home made?).

Assassins, a popular game played in a multitude of places is a good way to make students paranoid and encourage creativity and dissention within the ranks. The idea behind the game is that each participant is given a water gun. They're then also given a target to eliminate. They have to shoot the target in appropriate conditions (often times living environments are off limits so they have to get them on the quad or something of that matter). Once they take out their target they then adopt the target of their victim, until there's only one left standing. Once shot a player is terminated from the game entirely. It can be a lot of fun if rules are set down and everyone knows every one else who's playing.

In order to help combat unofficial and other huge-drinking events a Mock-tails party might be placed into action. This would consist of perhaps many different events and simply supplement things. Non-alcoholic drink mixtures could be taught and served throughout the night.

Videogame night is something that's been done in the past. There are various possibilities for such an event - if a collection of TV's or projectors are gathered then multi-gender console games become a valid possibility. DDR is also another traditional hit. Other possibilities include LAN parties - either computers gathered in a central location or gaming conducted over the network in the dorms. This caters to Xbox Halo- and similar games, as well as famous computer games like Counter-Strike.

Lastly, a semiformal might be a complex or simple event. Simplistic get-dressed-and-go-to-the-cafe type events are possible, as are ones that might rent out hotels or the Union and involve a catering service or more. Most people that helped run or plan one of these in High School knows about the possibilities. Be warned, they often times cost a significant amount of money, and demand a great deal of effort.

Winter Holiday Notions
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There are many, many options, but as Winter break takes over most of the holiday time, it's a bit limited. One strong possibility for Avalanche could be an opening decoration and hang out party - much like the one we had this year, but perhaps on a larger scale.