Cedars, November 2017

November 2017 4 CAMPUS Campus Experience Turns One Student Life Programs and Event Services finish first year as combined group by Zach Krauss L ast November, the office of Student Life Programs and Event Services officially joined forces under the office of Campus Experience. Event Services works to create on-campus events for off-campus guests, many of which were oriented to grade- school students. Student Life Programs includes groups such as SCAB, the information desk, and Rinnova, which together comprise a large group of hired students each year. Prior to the shift to Campus Experience, Event Services was technically a branch underneath the Marketing office, as well as the Enrollment Services office. Before that, Events Services was underneath Admissions. Student Life Pro- grams, or SLP, was always located underneath the branch of Student Life and Christian Ministry, which also houses offices such as Resident Life, Office of Student Develop- ment, etc. At the time, the Marketing and Enrollment Manage- ment offices were one entity, with Event Services func- tioning to help manage the events put on by the joint office. In late 2016, however, Marketing became its own office, while Enrollment Management became another. Janice Supplee became the vice president of Marketing, and Scott Van Loo became the vice president of Enroll- ment Management. Jim Amstutz, who was in charge of both Event Services and Graduate Admissions, went to serve solely as the director of Graduate Admissions, and Event Services was placed under the direction of Brian Burns. Campus Experience as an office took the student aspect of SLP and the guest and faculty and staff aspect of Event Services and meshed them together. Campus Experience’s mission statement is “to support the mission and vision of Cedarville University by providing an exceptional and holis- tic customer experience for the students, faculty, staff, and guests of Cedarville University” Burns, who was originally the director of SLP, said that the change came out of opportunity, rather than necessity. He always wants people to know that SLP and Event Ser- vices were never broken individually. “Event Services was doing super well on its own, and I like to think Student Life Programs was, too. It just made sense to put the two offices together in order to make things even better,” Burns said. Before the connecting of the offices, Event Services worked a lot with events that were student-interest based. Events like CedarMania and Junior Jam all function as events that clearly show grade-school students the truth of the Gospel while also functioning as effective recruiting ministries for the university. Burns mentioned it made sense that Event Services would have originally resided underneath Admissions and then Enrollment Services because both of those offices rely on student recruitment and interaction. However, he said, it also made sense to involve Student Life Programs as well. Student Life Programs helps organize many of the student events on campus, including Alt Nights, CULead, Elliv, Campus Christmas and any other events that di- rectly involve students. While events like Music Show- case and Junior Jam are catered to the guests that arrive and register for them, students on campus are almost always involved. Because of the large number of guests and small number of staff on Event Services, the program needs college student volunteers in order to make its events happen. Burns said he sees this connection as one that not only makes Campus Experience a sensible name for the merged entity, but also makes the reason for the combination clear. He explained that students are so involved with events on campus that it makes sense for them to be in the same de- partment. “Everything SLP and Event Services does is something that is a campus experience for students,” Burns said. “Ju- Photo by Lauren Jacobs Front: Theresa Long, event support specialist; Chrissy Faulkner, event manager; Morgan Koster, event manager. Back: Dan MacDougall, assistant director of Student Life Programs; Brian Burns, director of Campus Experience; Loren Kuhn, event manager.