The Student Government Association (SGA) came together to celebrate Founder’s Day on Monday, Nov. 13 in Arnow Campus Center. Founder’s Day is a tradition to celebrate the university’s founding, hosting an event to commemorate the day.
The event, which had a turnout of almost 100 people, was a casino night hosted by the club. It featured tables where students could participate in blackjack, roulette, and poker. Several other clubs on campus donated items as prizes for students to win.
Director of Student Activities and Orientation Thomas Morgan said SGA wanted to make this year’s celebration special for students.
“Founder’s Day is an annual event run by SGA, but it has felt very stale the past few years,” Morgan said. “The students on SGA wanted to make it fresh and exciting while still honoring Lasell’s history…”
SGA President Arielle Hornbaker said SGA’s main goal was to get other clubs involved to help build community involvement.
“...One of our goals for this year is connecting with different organizations across campus, just really promoting unity on campus,” Hornbaker said. “That’s definitely something that as the student governing body, we feel that we need.”
Each year, SGA hosts an event for students to celebrate the founding of the institution. As the club looked to plan an event for the day, Hornbaker said they wanted to get as many people involved as possible.
“The reason we decided to do this event is because we wanted to do something kind of big for Founder’s Day, that’s a really important day,” Hornbaker said. “...So we settled on a casino night because we’re kind of, more than anything, I think people are looking for connection and opportunities to have fun with their friends, and then we tied our cause into that as well, but I thought the turnout was great.”
Hornbaker said the club does not typically host big events, so it was an obstacle to figure out how casino night would run.
“We’re not a programming body,” Hornbaker said. “We don’t put on a lot of events. So just kind of figuring that out, I guess, in a sense was a challenge. But at the same time, it was very rewarding to kind of better understand how to program, even what students are looking for right now.”
In addition to having a strong turnout, Hornbaker said the students who did get involved were active and engaged throughout the entirety of the night.
“It wasn’t an event that people just popped into, like, people stuck around to play the games, which was really cool to see,” Hornbaker said.
Morgan also said he was happy with the involvement the students brought to the event.
“I think it went amazingly well,” Morgan said. “We had so many casino games, great prizes, and an amazing turnout, but most impressive to me was the level of engagement that students had with the event and with each other. I saw a lot of students stay through the whole event and have fun the whole time.”
SGA said they have gotten all “positive” feedback surrounding the event and that it is something they will consider doing again.
As the semester is approaching its close, Hornbaker said the next big event SGA has in store is Midnight Breakfast.
“We’re really excited about [it] and hope everybody comes to just kind of reward yourself for hard work this semester and prepare for finals,” Hornbaker said.
Additionally, Hornbaker said SGA is looking to host a trivia or bingo night with Lasell Village for an intergenerational event, and that including Villagers is “very important” to them.
Morgan said the involvement from the Villagers is something that went well during the Founder’s Day event, and that it is something SGA hopes to continue to see in the future.
“....I wanted to highlight again the involvement from Lasell Village and the Alumni Association,” Morgan said. “A few residents from the Village donated raffle prizes and members of the Alumni Association served as card dealers. It was great to see all different generations of Lasell community members being involved in this event.”