The last bingo night of the spring semester just wrapped up on Wednesday, April 16, complete with some of the most desired prizes given up and an excited but smaller attendance of students, which normally happens as the academic year draws to a close.
Along with that, the Student Life Board (SLB) decided to go all out with the food. It should be noted that while the SLB and the office of Student Life & Activities are closely aligned and work together often, they are two separate entities. Members of the SLB help with events such as these but have their own events for students as well.
Collin’s Arena 15 minutes before the start of bingo night.
The standard for the food given during previous school years was simply plain pizza, chips and possibly a dessert. But since the fall 2024 semester, a wider variety of snacks have been introduced.
Last semester during the three holiday-themed Bingo nights, Halloween-themed cupcakes, pumpkin pie and sugar cookies were put out for attendees. During the March bingo night, penne alla vodka was also available.
For the last bingo night of the semester, the staff laid out pizza, multiple sandwich items from Jersey Mike’s paired with condiments and a half dozen boxes of cookies. The bingo night had gone from an event to grab pizza to an event where students can grab an entire dinner plus a satisfying dessert.
This final bingo was a rousing success. There were more than enough prizes for the winners and those who had gotten bingo but couldn’t reach the prize table on time. Those players were still able to obtain small plushies.
For the main prizes, organizers leaned heavily on a fan favorite – Legos. It seemed like there were twice as many Lego prizes on the table this bingo night, which did not disappoint students in the slightest.
One of the first prizes of the night was a package with two items (many prizes are multiple items in a large plastic bag). It was a Hippo squish pillow and a Harry Potter Lego set, the oddest combination that nonetheless excited students.
As bingo night tradition goes, staff who read out the numbers chose which prizes were next by how loud students shouted. If they hovered their hand over a prize and not enough students screamed, the prize wouldn’t be selected.
“If you don’t scream, you’re not participating in democracy!” lectured SLB Vice President Benjamin Kuleshov to attendees.
With the end of the academic year, the leadership of the SLB is changing. President Ismony Darbouze and Vice President Kuleshov will be leaving after this year. Both have been instrumental in changes to activities on campus, which have helped in attracting more students.
But all members of the SLB and from the office of Student Life & Activities have worked hard all year long to make events more fun for the students. Anyone who attends these events often will see a lot of familiar faces always running around with supplies. Food, prizes at bingo, posters to put up around campus, beverages and decorations.
As with previous bingo nights, there was a QR code for students to scan with a survey to fill out to let the office of Student Life and Activities know how they enjoyed the game. If you had been to the game on April 16, but didn’t fill out the survey, below is the QR code.
