BY ERICA MILOSH

Poetry Club is one of the most recognized clubs on campus that continues to evolve with each semester. The club gained popularity when Class of 2014 student, Dan Snyder, ran the group around Fall 2010. Former member of the Nichols English department, Professor Samantha Libby, also helped to build up the club and inspired students with her own poetry and feedback.

Now senior English majors, Marquice Jackson and Ian Sotoloff, who have expanded and diversified the organization, lead the club. Poetry Club frequently puts on poetry slams and open mic nights where anyone can read their work. So far this semester, Japanese slam poet G. Yamazawa has visited the campus and a small poetry slam was held on Jan 30. G. Yamazawa has been featured on the Button Poetry YouTube channel with nearly 400,000 views.

“Poetry Club has become more of a safe haven for students to vent, write, or just sit down and absorb the poetry,” Marquice explains.

The club has big ideas for some future events and collaborations. With the help of poetry club advisor, Katie Moulton, the club is forming a partnership with Bartlett High School. This will allow Bartlett students to attend poetry related events on campus, and Nichols members will be allowed to judge student poetry competitions at Bartlett High School.

Junior economics major, Robert Beauvoir, describes what club meetings are like. “It’s a really cool environment that motivates me to practice my writing.”

Upcoming on-campus events include a celebration of National Poetry Month. Poetry Club and the English department will be presenting their poetry in the library on April 18. There are also plans for the club to put on a show with Dream Junkies on April 13. Dream Junkies are a hip-hop group from southern California who have opened for popular artists such as Snoop Dogg and Wu-Tang Clan.

Marquice is satisfied with how diverse the club has become. There are members of every ethnicity who are free to write about any topic in any form. Most common styles of poetry used are free verse and spoken word. Popular themes include fear, family, success, sex, and many controversial topics.

This year there are 25 members of the Poetry Club with about 10-15 students performing regularly at open mic nights and slams. New members are always welcome and club meetings are every Thursday at 3:30 in Fels, room 323.

BY ERICA MILOSH

On April 12 in Daniels Auditorium there will be an interactive “Career Fair” style event intended to explore identity and perspective. Participants will enter the auditorium and be given a new identity and resume. There will be six booths at the “fair” that each participant will visit; the idea is to collect as many stamps as possible at these booths.

Professor Cathy Temple, and Senior English major Marquice Jackson designed the event. The idea came about last fall semester when discussing how to experience the working world from other perspectives.

Teachings from philosopher, Marcus Aurelius, have also influenced this project. One quote in particular, “Everything we hear is an opinion, not a fact. Everything we see is a perspective, not the truth,” should be kept in mind as students peruse the fair.

“We want to show students that other people don’t experience the world the same way you do,” Cathy said.

The “fair” can be classified a social experiment intended to make students question why some individuals are more desirable than others in the job market and how people are viewed by institutions. Other factors, unknown to most students, affect employability.

“The dream is for everyone to be treated equal, but not everyone is treated the same,” Cathy said.

Cathy and Marquice encourage the Nichols community to attend the event and learn about how the world works for everyone differently. At the end of the fair, Cathy and Marquice will reveal a valuable lesson about the resumes and the reality of the working world.

This interactive experience will be held April 12 in Daniels Auditorium at 3:30 p.m.

BY ERICA MILOSH

According to charitywater.com, 663 million people in the world live without clean water. That’s almost twice the amount of people living in the U.S. Humanities Program Chair, Dorrie Nang, and her students decided to raise money in order to help those in need of clean water. All of the donations will benefit Charity: Water, a nonprofit organization dedicated to bringing clean water to every person in the world.

Professor Nang said that a few motivated students became interested in making a difference after watching a film about the need for water in her Around the World in 80 Days course. Students Jessica Rotondo, Taylor Robohm, Nicole Penniman, and Briana Doyle are planning a series of fundraisers to help more people acquire access to clean water.

Professor Nang and her students are busy scheduling raffles, coin drives, bottle drives, and a Charity Water Ball. The water ball will be a semi-formal dance with a student DJ and appetizers for the attendees. Tickets for the ball will be on sale early March, at the cost of $10 a person. All of the proceeds from the tickets will be donated to the charity.

Water is a fundamental and required aspect of life that everyone takes for granted. The students are passionate about the cause because people’s lives can be changed drastically for the better once they have access to clean water. Traveling to collect water consumes precious time. Children often miss school because they are helping to collect water and many women walk up to 8 hours a day to get to a water source that isn’t even clean. If everyone had access to water, children could stay in school, health would improve for all, and the women who spend hours traveling to get it could focus on improving their own lives.

Professor Nang and her students hope to raise $3,000 between the collective projects. They plan for the Charity Water Ball to be the biggest attraction to raise awareness in the Nichols community. The water ball will be held on April 2 in the Athletic Center from 8 p.m.-12 a.m.