West Area Wolfpack: Community Building Rotation 1: Morrill Hall

Brace yourselves. What I'm about to say might come as a shock.

I'm a nerd.

Okay, you probably already knew that. If you've been to my office at all, you've probably noticed my bobble head doll of Sheldon Cooper or my plush normal distribution. You've never been to my apartment, and probably never will venture there, but inside, you'll find a Periodic Table shower curtain, a coffee mug with the rules to "Rock Paper Scissors Lizard Spock," a sweatshirt that quoting "If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate," and a board game collection that could rival any of the residence halls' collections. The signs are there.

So, it should come as no surprise that when I heard Morrill was hosting a Trivia night, I immediately cleared my schedule (okay, so it was open, but I would have) so that I could attend.

Seventh and Eighth floor RAs Drew Nash and Marji Itayem put together a trivia night for their residents. These residents are all a part of the Honors LLC, and as such, were just as excited about trivia night as I was. I'll be honest, though, I was not expecting it to be anything like it actually was.

If you've ever played trivia in a restaurant, you'll know that typically a question is asked, the table talks it over and then walks a piece of paper up to the announcer and submits it. But in Morrill, things are always taken one step further. Master-Of-All-Things-Computers Drew organized the whole trivia night to be paperless! I don't know anything about computers, so I can't even begin to describe HOW he did it, but I can just give an overview of how it worked.

Step 1: Residents divide into groups of 4. Each group must have at least one female and one male member. Each group has some piece of technology (i.e. laptop, tablet).
Step 2: Drew assigns each group a number.
Step 3: Questions are displayed on Drew's super nice TV. It could be the 7th floor lobby TV, but I doubt it.
Step 4: Residents go to morrillhall.com/7 and find a link to the Trivia Night submissions sheet. Residents enter the answer and submit.
Step 5: The answers submitted by each team magically pop up on Drew's Ipad.
Step 6: Drew opens an excel spreadsheet and enters the score for each team.

It was pretty ingenious.

The trivia topics had a little bit of something for everyone. There were a total of 6 categories with 5 questions each, for a total of 30 questions. The topics included UT, Housing Policies, Politics, Sports, Movies and TV, and...I don't remember. There was one other topic--maybe it was a miscellaneous one.
Marji served as the Alex Trebek of trivia night, reading each of the questions aloud, and also perusing the lobby to ensure that there was no googling going on--not that that would ever happen. :)

I partnered with three gentlemen of the 7th floor, and an 8th floor lady joined in about half way through. Needless to say, we dominated. Well--dominated until the bonus. At the time, I didn't know that David Cameron is the current Prime Minister of Great Britain, but you can bet I'll never forget it. My team finished second, but Drew graciously allowed us to share in some of the prize (Thanks, Drew)!

Marji and Drew put on a hugely successful community builder that targeted multiple community development objectives and also garnered a lot of interest from residents. The program had an academic tone about it, but it also encouraged good communication, use of social skills in meeting new people, and collaboration techniques.

There were about 30 residents in attendance, which is huge! The 7th floor lobby was full! And--perhaps one of the most exciting pieces--everyone stayed the whole time! Seeing the interactions of both Drew and Marji with their residents was so encouraging. It is evident that both have worked very hard during these first few weeks to get to know their residents and to connect them to the floor.

Enough of my blabbing--enjoy some pictures!

Listening intently to the question!

Focus on: 1) Drew's awesome setup there in the front. 2) The intensity and focus of the residents participating. 3) The empty jar of salsa. I forgot to mention that Marji and Drew provided snacks!