NationStates Jolt Archive

I am going to be president of my dorm next year (Uphaus dorm btw, yeah, I'm a dork) and as such I am going to be in charge of dorm sponsored events. Dorm sponsored events, by nature, suck badly. They are ultimately lame and no one comes if there is no pizza. Personally, I am all for bribing people with pizza to come to a beginning of the year party, but I'd like it if they would come otherwise. One draw I do have is that I can make it a brother-sister dorm party (we don't have co-ed dorms). So, I need ideas. What college events, let me clarify affordable college events, would people actually be interested in? One last note for clarity, this is school sponsored so no beer, drugs, strippers, exotic dancers, sex, etc. etc.

Some ideas I have are:
Cliché Social Mixer. Food, drinks, maybe a raffle all outside between the two dorms. Probably some music too, but not live unfortunately.

A game/comeptition of some sort to receive a gift certificate or something. Unfortunately my RE says no poker. There is a no gambling rule and even if we don't bet he thinks a poker competition for the prize is too close to the line.

The old standby, a pizza party. This one I'd prolly just do for the guys dorm.

So basically, my ideas all suck. Help.

I am going to be president of my dorm next year (Uphaus dorm btw, yeah, I'm a dork) and as such I am going to be in charge of dorm sponsored events. Dorm sponsored events, by nature, suck badly. They are ultimately lame and no one comes if there is no pizza. Personally, I am all for bribing people with pizza to come to a beginning of the year party, but I'd like it if they would come otherwise. One draw I do have is that I can make it a brother-sister dorm party (we don't have co-ed dorms). So, I need ideas. What college events, let me clarify affordable college events, would people actually be interested in? One last note for clarity, this is school sponsored so no beer, drugs, strippers, exotic dancers, sex, etc. etc.

Some ideas I have are:
Cliché Social Mixer. Food, drinks, maybe a raffle all outside between the two dorms. Probably some music too, but not live unfortunately.

A game/comeptition of some sort to receive a gift certificate or something. Unfortunately my RE says no poker. There is a no gambling rule and even if we don't bet he thinks a poker competition for the prize is too close to the line.

The old standby, a pizza party. This one I'd prolly just do for the guys dorm.

So basically, my ideas all suck. Help.

With these sort of rules you may struggle to get any visitors (apart from maybe the Jehovahs Witnesses);)

Good luck with your quest though

Get a hypnotist.

Everyone loves watching someone else make an ass of themselves.

A game/comeptition of some sort to receive a gift certificate or something. Unfortunately my RE says no poker. There is a no gambling rule and even if we don't bet he thinks a poker competition for the prize is too close to the line.

Give up.

Nothing else is affordable. Our college does inane stuff for events, but they arn't affordable. I think there was a segway race once, I have no idea how they got segways....

Hmmm… let’s see some of the stuff we did in my dorm that was legal…

We had an “Olympics” between two competing dorms with serious stuff like basketball games, to goofier stuff like inner tube water polo and dorm-to-dorm tug of war and non-athlete events like backgammon, chess and Scrabble. We had coed floors in our dorms, though, so it made the sporting events a little more even. And fun.

We had teams play other floors in a Trivial Pursuit tournament. (Mind you, the game was fairly new back then.)

We had all night movie-fests. A costume contest at Halloween. A semi-formal holiday party that no one went to.

Dorm events suck precisely because you are prohibited from doing anything fun - why go to a dorm event when you could just go to a party?

People will show up, nosh the food (because hey, free food) then leave.

It all depends on your dorm and what kind of people live there. Right at the beginning you are going to have to be a social butterfly and talk to everyone. Find out what kind of things they are interested in, what they like to do for fun, what hobbies they have, if they play an instrument, etc.

Then make an event that fits those interests and talents. You might find you have a band in the dorm - boom, live music and its your own neighbors (for free). If there is any community spirit at all, they will turn out to show support for their band.

There are loads of things to do, but people will only turn out if it is something that fits their kind of quirkyness.

How about an Ultraman style fight? Takes a bit of planning but gets loads of attention - out in the most public area if possible so you can build the dorm reputation around campus. The dorm breaks up into teams and spends a month building costumes like Ultraman monsters. Then you build a boxing ring kind of platform and have matches pitting then against each other. The judges (or just going by crowd cheers) determines the winner based upon the costume originality and execution as well as fighting prowess and special moves (hedgehog turns around and shoots a dozen spikes at the opponent - a little co2 cartridge can get some good distance with foam spikes).

The theater department could probably provide the platform stage, the gym some mats to cushion it, the arts dep could probably hook you up with lots of scrap to make the costumes.

Get creative with the talents of your dorm.

If you have a couple budding chefs you could have a little cooking competition - cook up lots of eats and the residents vote on which was best. Buying food in bulk is pretty cheap.

You really need to talk to all the residents - finding out what they do and are interested in is a great way to break the ice and get to know everyone anyway.

Sulking in the corner, uh, awkward slow dances to polka, watermelon seed spiting contest, turtle races, uh, egg on a spoon races...

Just get some huge tvs and tell everyone to bring their game systems and games to the common room...

Just get some huge tvs and tell everyone to bring their game systems and games to the common room...

Yeah, that plus pizza is our end of the semester party already though. :p