Valentine’s Day is a perfect occasion for the students to band together and spread love throughout the community, which is exactly what Winona State University’s Art Club and Recreation, Tourism and Therapeutic Recreation (RTTR) Club teamed up to achieve from Jan. 26 to Feb 12.
The clubs hosted a card drive over the course of the two weeks with a card making event held in Watkin’s Hall on Feb 12. Two boxes were set up in Watkins and Maxwell Halls, collecting Valentine’s Day cards to be handed out to residents at Watkins Manor and Sugar Loaf Senior Living. Lindsay Bergan, President of RTTR says the event was a great way for the club to expand their network into the community.
“We wanted to do something like service work, trying to dip our toes into that because we’ve been mostly just recreation for students and [we are] trying to create more memories and connections to different facilities in Winona,” Bergan said.
Bergan hopes to work further with senior living homes in Winona, and this event is a great way to open the door for that to happen. A major demographic within the RTTR club is Therapeutic Recreation majors, and working with the elderly is a big part of that field of work. The club’s goal is to work to prepare members for the careers they could go into, and building this bridge to opportunities within Winona is a great experience for RTTR students. “It’s just great to have that exposure of actually seeing how facilities are run,” Bergan stated.
Bergan believes that it is important to give attention to the seniors in the community because nursing homes can feel very lonely sometimes and it is important to her and the rest of the RTTR and Art Club to remind them that they are thought of and bring them some joy. The club collected 135 cards for the seniors.
Ava Beal, officer of the Art club as well as member of RTTR, had initiated the idea for a collab, knowing that it would be a great opportunity for the Art Club to broaden its network with other clubs. Jia Ryan president of the Art Club, agrees, saying, “Being able to collaborate with another club might lead to other opportunities too. It would be nice to pass on to whoever is a future president, and just to open that door for people in the future and other clubs to collaborate with us.”
The Art Club is a relatively new club on campus. They are excited to become more involved on and off campus, especially as art is such a broad interest and welcoming community with something for everybody to enjoy. They have put on events such as chalk the campus and Bob Ross nights and invite all majors to attend their meetings every other Thursdays.
“One of our biggest drives as a club, like what we kind of market ourselves as is a safe space for people to, um, get together and express themselves creatively,” said Beal. For her, it is important to give students the opportunity to interact with people and communities on campus that maybe they haven’t been able to before. She sees big potential between the Art Club and RTTR because art can be such a major factor of recreation and therapy, which typically RTTR students don’t typically embrace.
The Clubs are looking forward to continuing this event annually and looking to set up collection boxes in more busy areas such as Kryzsko Commons to attract more participants. They hope to connect to more people and inspire creativity and community across campus.
