Grade: A-
SUB has continued to see success in its annual events, with increased attendance, and been a positive presence on campus. Not only has SUB put on a number of fun events for the Student Body, but according to several of its members, it has provided a strong sense of community for them and created more opportunities for its members — especially freshmen — to get involved.
Commemorating its 50th anniversary this spring, the Student Union Board (SUB) has seen increased turnout at a number of its annual events and has collaborated with other organizations across campus, according to SUB executive director Louis Bertolotti.
SUB sold possibly a record number of tickets to its fall concert, featuring Hoodie Allen and Sammy Adams, and was successful at retaining the crowd, Bertolotti said.
“We sold about 1,800 tickets, which is just about our record, or it is the record since recent memory of anyone here,” he said. “They put on a really good show, and we were really happy working with them.
“We had a lot of enthusiasm and a lot of people stayed for the whole time which is really good too because in past years sometimes people left after the opener.”
After inviting Ollie Vue, the Instagram-famous three-legged golden retriever puppy, to Notre Dame, SUB also saw record turnouts at Dogs and Donuts.
“Dogs and Donuts this year had like five times the number of attendees it ever has,” Kelly Monahan, co-director of programming, said. “We had like 500 people come out. It’s usually a really casual event so that is also just really cool to see how adding in something innovative and new to one of our standard events can really change the vibe and attendance.”
In order to increase collaboration with Student Government and other groups, SUB created a new position: collaborative liaison. According to Bertolotti, the collaborative liaison, Neil Joseph meets with the student body president and vice president each week to integrate Student Government policy with SUB planning (Editor's Note: Neil Joseph is a Viewpoint columnist for The Observer).
“This year, actually, we started a new position,” Bertolotti said. “His job is specifically to identify areas for collaboration where we can put on events with other different groups or things on campus.
“So, most notably, he sits on cabinet, which is the executive board of student government and so he is every week talking to Corey and Becca kind of about what they’re planning and what their goals are so that we can infuse policy within our programming.”
SUB has also created a new branch, First Year Student Union Board (FYSUB), to increase freshmen participation in SUB.
“What we’ve done with FYSUB [is] it’s just a new program in which [freshmen] get to learn the skills, kind of similar to FUEL or FCC, of planning events and sort of what SUB does, as well as being more integrated into the committees,” Jackson Herrfeldt, SUB director of operations, said.
Continuing to increase its visibility, SUB has begun using MailChimp to email students about SUB events each week. According to Patrick Tinsley, director of publicity, the emails get around 1,500 views per week.
“The idea to start using MailChimp was actually inspired by TheWeek@ND,” Tinsley said. “We wanted to start a newsletter that looked appealing, yet still conveyed all the information about our events.”
SUB has also utilized Facebook Live this year to allow more people to watch AcoustiCafe, as some aren’t able to see it in person.
“In case you can’t make it to the show but you still want to see your friend perform, you can watch it from your room, or a lot of people’s parents are really excited about Facebook Live so we’re hoping to continue that,” Aline Irihamye, another co-director of programming, said.
For the upcoming semester, SUB is in the early stages of planning AnTostal, which will also celebrate its 50th anniversary this spring.
“We are working on getting some sort of maybe art installation piece or some sort of display that commemorates the 50th anniversary, but not something static that just we make and put out but something that the student body can interact with,” Isabel Piechowicz, director of art, said.
Logan Bridge, another co-director of programming, said he feels SUB’s members have continued to become closer each year.
“Each year there’s more camaraderie within SUB so it feels less like a club where we’re just planning things and more like a group of friends that would hang out once a week at our club meetings, and we just happen to put on a lot of events that school year,” he said.
