Our faculty student group organized a huge mixer for incoming first years and their paired upper year mentor. The turnout was over 200 people! Well over capacity for the small area – it was way to packed to navigate, much less find your mentor.
From the advertisements, they hyped to the food aspect too much, many people got the impression it was akin to a buffet, that food would be flowing non-stop. I got there 10 min late, and all the food was demolished. Scraps of chips were left – all the good, hot foods were gone.
From reading the budget request reports, they anticipated 80 students attending…
With a crowd of 200, it was very difficult to organize any icebreaker activities, much less get the attention of the crowd. The organizer went on stage to yell instructions for games but the crowd didn’t respond whatsoever. The poor organizer gave up defeated after several failed attempts to gain attention of the masses.
It would have been wise to split the mixer over 2 nights, with a much more manageable crowd as well as enough food to keep everyone happy. But it would cost considerably more, which is why the organizers probably decided against it.
By the time I got there, this was all that was left…
Many people didn’t even get to eat, despite their only reason for attending was the food. They are desperately feeding off the leftover scraps.
