Clubs & Organizations recently released a ‘passport’ for students to get stamped when attending a cultural event, with the chance of being entered into a raffle for a prize at the end of spring term if the passport is used.
The blue passports, similar in size and design to their real counterparts, were developed by Clubs & Organizations, who help host cultural events, to increase attendance and awareness. They were initially available at a Clubs & Organizations tabling events last week, but all 150 were handed out. They put in a second order of 75 this week, and if demand is there, they’ll order more for spring term.
Clubs & Organizations has been working on the project since the summer, and during fall term began developing and prototyping the passport.
According to Chanel Akazawa, media and marketing specialist for Clubs & Organizations, the idea of using passports was a way to tie in the international and multicultural aspects of the cultural events and to serve as a memento for students.
“We referenced a lot of actual passports from different countries, and wanted to tie in different cultural symbols from all of the events that we’re featuring this year,” Akazawa said. “So you can see a lot of the artwork is kind of reminiscent of that, and we wanted to reflect it as accurately as possible.”
In creating the actual passport, Akazawa said they used Canva, an online graphic design website.
Since the marketing team at Clubs & Organizations is only a year old, they’re relying more on the student organizations involved with the cultural events to get the word out about the passports.
While no one has had the opportunity to use the passports, the feedback has been positive from the student organizations.
“They are interested in the fact that, ‘Oh my gosh, this is my event that’s in there. This makes it feel more real,’” Akazawa said.
To follow the usage of the passports and to see if it has any impact on attendance, Akazawa said Clubs & Organizations will track event attendance, which they already do, in addition to passport usage.
The raffle event for the passports is still in planning.
The first event where students can use their passport is at Taiwanese Cultural Night. The event is from 5:30 to 8:30 p.m. this Saturday in the Memorial Union Ballroom.
