STORMY WEATHER, complaints on excessive noise, and a collapsed set characterized what its project heads are deeming “the best Recruitment (RecWeek) Week ever.”
Themed “Take Flight: Choose your destination,” RecWeek was held at the Manuel V. Pangilinan Center for Student Leadership (MVP-CSL) roof deck on June 22 to 26.
RecWeek is an annual event, similar to a job fair, where students get to “org shop” and sign up for orgs.
Downs and downs
Project Head Iza Laza said that despite the early planning for RecWeek last March, the team still faced several challenges. “We were afraid that it would be postponed because of the A(H1N1) virus.”
The RecWeek Team also had difficulty coordinating with some offices including the Office of Administrative Services (OAS) and the Ateneo Environmental Management Coalition (AEMC).
“One of our sponsors was giving out samples and we had to work it out so it would comply with AEMC,” said Laza.
The typhoon Feria also threatened to hit Manila, prompting Laza to fear cancellation of RecWeek. “We had to end it early for a day because of the rain,” she said.
The strong winds also caused the decorative panel boards behind the org booths to tip over during the week. “We had to call the suppliers to re-install the panels,” said Logistics Head Anne Yu.
This year, RecWeek also asked the different Council of Organizations of the Ateneo (COA) clusters to perform throughout the week. But the cheers from the crowd and some org promotions disrupted some classes, said Co-Project Head Leslie Yu.
“What really ticked [them] off was the TnT presentation,” said Laza. “I think the noise reached the Interdisciplinary Department.”
TnTs are members of the Talk and Tours Committee of the Orientation Seminar (OrSem).
The RecWeek Team received two warnings from the OAS. “They said that there is a possibility that they will shut down RecWeek if we get another warning from any [other] office,” Yu said.
They had to negotiate to keep one speaker working “since we still had a program and we had Rock Band Competition for the students,” said Laza.
The OrSem delay was also a disadvantage for Laza. “Our promotions were weak, RecWeek would have [clicked] more with Orsem,” she said.
“But the TnTs were very helpful, they helped promote us… We also helped promote OrSem,” she said. The TnTs were allowed to dance the “Chuga” and “Banana” dances during RecWeek
Year of firsts
Because RecWeek was the first school-wide event, many changes were implemented to encourage more students, especially the freshmen, to sign up for orgs.
“We had to think of gimmicks to bring people upstairs [to the roof deck],” said Miggy Zaballero, president of the Council of Organizations of the Ateneo.
Laza said they originally planned for an open house in MVP so students could learn about the orgs. To avoid traffic and crowds in the rooms, they opted for cluster performances instead. The performances consisted of videos, game shows, and pageants.
This year’s RecWeek also opened its doors to all student groups on campus, including the Confederation of Publications, and the unaccredited and applying organizations.
Yu said that even though they still gave priority to the COA orgs, they also wanted to cater to the whole Ateneo community, so they merged all the student groups into one recruitment week.
For members of the unaccredited organizations, this move was both good and bad.
“It’s okay because there is more foot traffic but in a way, we’re also at a disadvantage because we are here for a shorter period of time [than the accredited orgs],” APART President Gen Go said.
APART Visual Art Collective is an applying organization. Along with other unaccredited orgs, they were given the chance to stay during RecWeek for three days.
“I guess it puts a little more competition,” said Miguel Clavano, a member of Toujin, an appreciation club for Japanese culture. In previous years, recruitment for unaccredited orgs was a week after. “[Then], it was easier for us to find the members that we wanted.”
“Now, we’re amidst all the other clusters and it’s very difficult,” he added.
Kurt Alvarez, meanwhile, said the merged RecWeek provided great visibility for their org, the Ateneo European Studies Society (AEuSS) since they also ended up getting non-European Studies majors as well.
Proud
Yu said that despite the many challenges her team faced, she would still say that this is the best RecWeek ever.
“RecWeek exceeded so much of our expectations and the whole core really feels so proud of everything we’ve accomplished,” she said.
COA Vice President for Special Projects Selene Uy said that many orgs posted a record number of sign-ups since the first day of RecWeek. “We didn’t expect that much.”
“It was fun and colorful. The event was organized well even though the space was only limited,” Gabay member Aljohn Gatchalian said.
Freshman Guio Manalo said that because the event looked interesting and fun, he went up the roof deck to see it. “They were also loud,” he added.
Ayesa Lemence, a sophomore, found RecWeek successful because she saw a lot of freshmen during the event. “There were also more freebies this year compared to last year,” she said.
“Kilig is the only word I have to describe the whole RecWeek,” said Laza, grinning.
To give the students more chance to sign up for the orgs after OrSem, COA decided to extend their recruitment week from July 6 to 8 at the orgs’ respective rooms.
