At the Feb. 1 senate meeting, Student Life’s Director of Student Engagement Stephen Cucchiara provided updates on student engagement and the department.
Cucchiara focused on student engagement successes from fall 2023, new initiatives that will start this semester and general news from the Department of Student Life.
According to Cucchiara’s presentation, a total of 15,198 people participated in Student Life-sponsored events last semester. Of those 15,198, 3,805 were individual, non-repeat students engaging in Student Life events. Cucchiara noted that both of these numbers increased from fall 2022.
“Over 38% of the student population engaged in some kind of an event last semester. Usually, in April, about 30 to 35% of our student population have engaged in an event,” Cucchiara said.
Despite more attendance, only 76 events were hosted last fall, which is a decrease from 88 in fall 2022. “You can see that while we have less events, there are more students looking to get engaged on campus, which is really exciting,” Cucchiara said.
Club registration has been consistent with the 2022-23 school year numbers. Cucchiara noted about 166 clubs and organizations were registered by the end of last semester, which is on track for where total registrations were in the fall of 2022.
“We’re still on pace to probably hit about 200 clubs and organizations,” he said. As of Feb. 1, 178 clubs have registered or are registering.
Cucchiara added that Winter Welcome Week also had significant attendance despite a canceled event due to extreme weather temperatures on Jan. 16. There were 364 total attendees compared to last spring’s 373.
Club Fair attendance was also slightly down this year from last, with 546 students attending compared to 573 last spring. Cucchiara said this was due to the event being hosted in Berger Hall, which has limited occupancy.
To get students more involved, Student Life is launching a new incentive-based engagement program called Clyde’s Five. Cucchiara said the program is intended to help students at UCCS get a well-rounded experience of everything offered to them at UCCS.
The program targets five areas of student engagement: holistic well-being, global engagement, social responsibility, traditions of belonging and everyday leadership. Students who complete the Clyde’s Five by attending events or being involved in clubs, which will be tracked through MLC, will be honored at the Roar Awards in April.
In other news:
- Heather Marx has stepped down from her position as the student activities specialist and moved to a position in the provost’s office.
- Student Life is working with the Zeta Phi Beta organization to give them a more active presence on campus. The department is also trying to get Latinx male organizations involved on campus.
- There will be an informational meeting about the election on Feb. 9 at 6 p.m. in UC 122.
- There will be a mandatory candidate meeting on Feb. 12 at 6 p.m. in UC 303.
Photo from The Scribe Archives.