Student organizations use summer for planning, not parties

The William Pitt Union might not be packed with speakers and events during the warm summer… The William Pitt Union might not be packed with speakers and events during the warm summer evenings, but a few student groups still stay busy.

“The summer is a very important time for us because we have a lot of programs and initiatives [to plan for the fall],” Black Action Society President Jahmaiah Lewis said in an e-mail.

She said the officers hold monthly conference calls to set goals and make decisions about events they’ll hold in the fall and spring semesters.

However, that doesn’t give the relatively small number of students on campus much to do.

“To be completely honest, I’ve never thought about having events during the summer, because we use the time to plan for the upcoming year,” she said.

There are a few clubs that have events in the summer, including the Pittsburgh Electronic Musicians.

The group of disc jockeys and electronic composers performs at least once a month, Pitt alumnus and president of the group Sachem Orenda Clark, said. He is better known by simply Sachem Orenda.

“Most of the really dedicated members stayed,” he said, adding that the club still meets weekly in the summer.

Rainbow Alliance President James Weaver agreed with Lewis that the summer is a crucial time for administrative work.

Weaver said Rainbow Alliance’s leaders’ main goal for the summer is to revise the organization’s constitution. They want to change the qualifications to be an active and voting member, as well as the perception of the club.

“People assume it’s a gay club, which it shouldn’t be. It’s open to anyone of any orientation,” he said. “People [shouldn’t] assume you’re gay for being there.”

Rainbow Alliance plans few activities during the summer because it doesn’t think many people would attend them. Weaver said he’s part of the problem.

“I’m going to be home for most of the summer,” he said.

To compensate for the decreased number of events on campus, students pay a lower activities fee during the summer.

Full-time undergraduate students pay $80 per term in the fall and spring semesters and $14 in the summer. Part-time students pay $24 for the fall and spring semesters and $7 in the summer semester.

Gina Scozzaro, business manager at the Student Organization Resource Center, said that during the summer, more graduate student organizations are active than undergraduate.

Pitt’s full-time and part-time graduate students pay $8 and $4, respectively, in the summer, vs. the $20 and $10 they pay per term in the fall and spring.

Natalie Swabb, an SORC employee, said it’s hard to keep up with the more than 400 undergraduate groups on campus. Organizations have to re-register with SORC every year or they are declared inactive. After two years of inactivity, they lose their certification.

Swabb said there’s no way SORC can find out whether a club is meeting over the summer or if its membership falls below the required 10 people until the club fails to re-register, which can happen at any time during the summer. At that time, SORC contacts the group leaders to tell them that their club is inactive.

This normally happens when a club forgets to re-register. It doesn’t show that the club has disbanded.

“I think decertification is a better indicator of clubs that have died down,” Swabb said.

Some clubs at Pitt that have fallen out of students’ favor are the Computer Gaming Club, the Frisbee Golf Club, Women in Math and Statistics, Squash Club and Skydiving Club.

There are several new clubs that will be at the Student Activities Fair on Aug. 30, including the Panther Partners Program, Reformed University Fellowship and the Chinese Martial Arts Association.

Chinese Martial Arts Association President David Tringali said his club will not benefit from the summer activities fee since they are not meeting in the summer. Tringali, who is in China through the Pitt in Wuhan program, said in an e-mail that he hopes to host instructors on the master-level during the regular school year.