Photo Courtesy of Student Involvement
Patriot Activities Council starts spring semester with winter warm-up
BY ALEXA TIRONI, ASSISTANT NEWS EDITOR
As the first week of classes and the spring semester begins, the Patriot Activities Council (PAC) is working hard to make sure students are feeling welcome and excited for the upcoming months.
Winter Warm-Up took place this past Thursday, Jan. 23, in Dewberry Hall. The evening featured multiple winter-themed activities such as mug and cookie decoration, DIY gingerbread houses, snow globes, a roller rink equipped with strobe lights, and a DJ. Students could dance to the music and skate, or they could sit with friends and help themselves to the waffle and hot cocoa bar.
Students in attendance seemed in high spirits. Freshman Emari Taylor stated that she came as a group with her floormates. “I’m always in my room and I needed to get out and do something,” said Taylor.
Junior Keren Danso spoke about her favorite part of the event, saying, “Roller-skating! We were all falling all over each other, it was so funny.”
Bex Hollis, PAC’s director of programming, said the event was created to be a fun start to the new semester. “Our goals were pretty much to welcome the students who were previously here in the fall, back to Mason, as a way to kick things off for the semester — and have some of the new students that transferred here to get connected, and it not be such a formal setting,” said Hollis.
Some upcoming PAC events include Sexploration on Feb. 13, “which is our Valentine’s Day take on sexual health. We want to make it super involved, super fun,” said Hollis.
This Wednesday, Jan. 29, comedian and mental health advocate Adam Grabowski will be coming to campus. On Friday, Jan. 31, PAC will be hosting a showing of the film “Knives Out” accompanied by free popcorn and snacks.
Another popular event of the spring semester is Homecoming, which will last two weeks instead of one. The headliner for this year’s Homecoming is “Saturday Night Live” comedian Colin Jost. He will perform on Thursday, Feb. 20, at 8 p.m. in the Center for the Arts.
If students want to get more involved with PAC and Student Involvement, they can join Street Team. “Street Team is the student body of PAC … our student-based, volunteer-based [team],” Hollis said. “We meet once a week on Tuesday nights at 7:30 p.m. We play a lot of games and just make sure we are all connected with any professional development we can give them through PAC.”
Students volunteer to work the events, and the job comes with some perks including receiving VIP passes on Mason Day to go backstage, and meet the artists and performers.
This semester, PAC is introducing a new loyalty program titled PAC Perks. The program features four Perks levels: Bronze, Silver, Gold and Platinum. Students will receive their level status based on the amount of PAC events they have checked in and out of over the course of the semester.
Visit PAC’s website or find them on social media to learn more about future events and activities on campus.
