UCC clubs can reopen with student engagement

Published by Katie Gray on

The pandemic caused many of UCC’s most active clubs to go dormant. The Queer Straight
Alliance, Healthy Minds, Automotive Club, and the Nursing Club, even the Nerd Herd which
used to be UCC’s most active club. Students struggle with making student connections from the
lack of availability of meeting times from classes being moved to online.

If a student is looking to join or start a club they can navigate to the Umpqua Community
College webpage and in the student calendar look for meeting times of the active clubs. The
currently active clubs Spanish, Programming, Forestry and the Metal Maniacs club are meeting
some on Zoom, some on campus.

Multiple clubs can be reopened if a student is interested. For example, “The Healthy Minds club
is currently inactive. Any interested student could go through the process of re-opening it and
getting it started again if they wanted though.” Hanna Culbertson UCC’s life coach says.

To reopen a club, the UCC webpage has a form for club recertification. The student who is
interested in this process needs 30 signatures on this form from current UCC students; email the form to ASUCCPresident@umpqua.edu. After that, the student will have to attend the ASUCC
meeting on a Tuesday at noon in Jackson Hall room 10 or via Zoom (to find the meeting ID, go
to Umpqua.edu, select the A to Z index and scroll down to ASUCC). March 8 is the last meeting
day for winter term. The second Tuesday of spring term is the first meeting for next term with an
updated Zoom link. The last step to recertify is to email Marjan Coester and set up a meeting
with her.

“ASUCC student board meetings are open to any student, and they are invaluable information
hubs to find out about council, clubs and other activities throughout campus. We want to help
students to find way to increase their engagement,” ASUCC student president says.

Not only that but there is a club list on the webpage that has current clubs that need to be
recertified to meet again. Many professors who run clubs hope to get them certified, like
Georgann Willis, the faculty advisor of the QSA club. She says, “The purpose of QSA is
to bring awareness and support to the LGBTQ+ community. Allies are also always welcome.
The club has lapsed over COVID and is working on recertification.”

Willis is not the only one who is hoping their club will get recertified. UCC’s Veterans Club
needs a petition to be signed for the club to be up and going again.

Clubs can still be active during the pandemic. The Alpha Sigma Upsilon chapter of Phi Theta
Kappa, UCC’s honor students, currently meets via Zoom. “We are currently meeting via Zoom;
however, the day and time have varied based on the availability of the officer team, so I’m not
able to give you a set time. We met on Sunday this past week,” Marjan Coester says.

Students who are interested in connecting with others and making UCC a more welcome
environment should contact ASUCC President Amanda Cerda. A National Survey of Student Engagement says Student clubs are very important to student life because there is a direct link for higher grades and more student enrollment in the next term.

This all seems to be linked to higher satisfaction overall. With things changing in Oregon on
March 11th, maybe it’ll inspire students to come to campus and interact more together.

Contact me at:
UCCMainstream@yahoo.com

For more articles by Katie Gray please click here.