How SF Improves UD Community and What They’re Up To this Year
Founded in 1976, the Student Foundation is the oldest student-run organization on campus. The mission of the Student Foundation is to promote the unique identity of the University of Dallas student body. It is unique itself in that it is one of the only official organizations at UD that operates completely on alumni and student donorship.
As such, the Student Foundation, or SF, enjoys a degree of independence and self-determination that sets it apart from other student organizations, and ensures that it remains a group of students acting for the students. SF Chair of Development Max Beatty said, “We get money from alumni and fundraising, and we use that money to give back to the school without having to go through Student Government or anything else. So we’ve got a lot of freedom with that.”
In past years, SF has done much to support UD culture and help beautify UD’s campus. Beatty said, “One of the biggest ways we try to improve campus culture is through Clash of the Classes in the spring. It’s a bunch of events like tuck-ins and Campus Beautification Day that are for students to have a good time and give back, kind of like Charity Week, but more as a fundraiser for SF to put back into the school.”
During last year’s Campus Beautification day, SF facilitated the building of the communal garden between Gregory and Jerome halls, planted new flowers at the St. Joseph and Marian statues and resodded the lawn outside the Church of the Incarnation, among other projects. The money raised by SF from Clash of Classes was used to redecorate the Rathskeller.
President of SF Joey Winland said about this spring’s Clash of the Classes, “We’re hoping to get it a lot bigger this year, having more people participate and have bigger beautification projects like building gaga pits and fire pits in Carpenter Grove and possibly fixing up the area outside the Cap Bar.”
In the meantime, SF is implementing a new series of events to get students involved in the community throughout the fall semester. Winland said, “We’re starting a new point system and having several events like a dodgeball tournament, capture the flag, volleyball and a trivia night. If you participate, you automatically get ten “SF points,” and if you win first place in an event you get fifty points, and so on for second and third. Whoever has the most SF points come December will get a free Groundhog ticket.”
Second place overall for SF points this semester will get a free spring formal ticket, and third place will get VIP seating at the Tower Film Festival.
Winland hopes this new SF points system will help bolster UD’s campus life and get people more involved in SF events, he said, “the idea is to have people continually doing stuff and continue to broaden and build up the community at the school.”
Winland said SF is also trying to put on a bigger and better Chili Fest this February in Carpenter Grove.
SF strives to fulfill its mission of promoting UD’s unique identity through building up the UD community. With the new SF points system in the fall and improved events like Chili Fest and Clash of the Classes in the spring, SF continues to bolster UD community and involvement this year.