Clubs in the COVID era

October 21, 2020

Jennifer Scholl

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. -- Penn State club leaders are learning more creative and innovative ways to recruit new members and keep them engaged while all events have been moved online.

Penn State restricted in-person activities for the Fall 2020 semester due to the COVID-19 pandemic. With contract tracing, in-person gatherings can get clubs into a lot of trouble if they contract the disease so clubs are almost entirely online. Penn State hosted an online Involvement Fair, but Braden Hiesler figured out a better way to promote campus organizations.

Braden Hielser is a junior studying Industrial Engineering. This August, Hielser took the initiative and created the Instagram account @PennStateInvolvement. He used the platform to promote clubs and organizations as an online bulletin board full of club fliers.

“[Penn State] did as much as they could, they did have the virtual career fair,” said Hiesler. However, as a student, he had a lot more freedom to make that sort of Instagram page. “They had limitations being affiliated with the university,” said Hiesler, “and there were no restrictions on what I could do.”

His Instagram now has over one hundred posts and over 1,200 followers. With a simple form for entry, Hiesler shared clubs from all different niches from the Renaissance Club to the American Hotel and Lodging Association.

Kelly O’Hora, a junior majoring in Hospitality Management, happens to be the President of the American Hotel and Lodging Association on campus which is not hosting any in-person events due to COVID-19 restrictions.

Recruiting new students has been hard in the COVID era. “A lot of people are incentivized to join, because we got to go on these fun trips, and we're not allowed to do them this semester” said O’Hora, but she found other ways to find new people.

“I went and spoke at one of the freshmen intro [to Hospitality] classes,” said O’Hora who said it was a more effective way to bring in new members. She also posted a flier to the @PennStateInvolvement Instagram account.

“Existing members that haven't been coming as much,” said O’Hora, “we are on zoom, and it's not mandatory that they go to every single meeting.” Retention rates for clubs have declined and keeping freshmen engaged can be difficult too.

Kaylie and Kylie Barber are two sisters in their first year on campus living in the same dorm. They are double majors in Biomedical and Mechanical Engineering and are finding it difficult to make friends in the Zoom infested social climate. Kaylie said the closest they got to meeting new people was when one of their clubs did a socially distanced hike of Mount Nittany. Otherwise, Kaylie said “I still don't feel that connected to anybody that I've met in any club.”

Making real social bonds has been really hard for freshman, and classes aren’t any different.

“We have one class, engineering design, where we meet some of the time in person. In that case, we're making more connections... [and we] also have a lot of group projects,” said Kylie.

Returning club members have seen changes too. Laura Brownstead, a junior studying Engineering Science, is active in many clubs. She has seen a big change in club engagement this semester.

“I noticed the spike of engagement in the beginning of the year hasn’t died out as much as I expected it to,” she said. “Involvement has gone up and... I think it’s because people are looking for things to do while in quarantine.”