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How to Reach Out on Campus
Matt Simpson, a student at the University of Western Australia in Perth, actively promoted his start-up meeting on campus. Read on for some fun ideas!
See Idealist On Campus to learn more about getting involved at your college or university.
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What outreach tools did you use to attract people to your start-up meeting?
I just had a stand at the "orientation day" at my university where thousands of students come to learn about various clubs and activities on campus. It was nothing too sophisticated as shown in the photo. Just me and a few buds. And I drove around the university grounds on my electric bike honking at people and handing out brochures, in particular making sure to get some to the environmental/humanitarian clubs and stands. I had rootsy music pumping from the stand and just approached a lot of people and handed out a heap of pamphlets I made.
What words and ideas did you use to attract people to your start-up meeting?
The brochure I essentially just patched together off the print on the website and also advertised for the start-up meeting on the back. As I
Matt and friends tabling on campus
haranged countless people through the day I started to pare down a kind of spiel that focused around establishing that I wasn't trying to sell them something and trying to distill its relevence to them with the makeshift description: "online networking platform and career portal for the not for profit sector"). This seemed to be effective in getting people interested. Generally because I love what I'm doing and believe in it, being able to give people some genuine enthusiasm was welcomed, I think. I had a few key examples of cool stuff I'd found on the site to throw out too, like, "I kid you not; you can find internships to go and herd reindeer in Mongolia on this site, it has just countless amazing opportunities!" And, "This is the one-stop-shop go-to site for the not for profit sector and empowering people to do the things that matter!"
How effective were these outreach methods on your campus?
Hard to say! I must say I was really heartened by how receptive people seemed to be to it on the day and also the number of people who approached my humble stand in an interested manner. Plus, a handful of people already knew about Idealist! Still, I thought this might mean more people would come to the start-up meeting, but I suppose it's a big leap from being interested and actually showing up to something. I think a lot of people would have checked out the website at the least based on their response, but there's no way to quantify this.
Do you have any advice for start-up meeting hosts who want to reach out at their college or university?
I think I was over ambitious to try to hold a general start up meeting at an off-campus location and would have been better advised to make a university-specific meeting on campus during "school hours." If I had had some support or been less under the pump recently I think supporting the original promotion with some print media around the uni would be an effective follow up and you could even chalk it up around the place and put it up on white boards in classrooms as well as the website address, etc. If you could get a higher frequency in your communication exposure I think it would give it more credibility in the mind of Joe and Jill student.
In my experience, though having had limited success to date, I think it's always important not to be preachy and to keep it fun. Not working from the assumption that positive community or global action requires a sacrifice and the sense that you do it because it's a rewarding, interesting thing to do. That to me represents a shift in tone that makes the process more inclusive to extend beyond the main (and small) faction of highly politicized students who want to change the world.
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Facebook groups and events
Another great way to spread the word on campus is through Facebook, a popular social networking site among students and others. It allows you to post events, invite other Facebook members, and see whether they plan to attend.
The following Facebook groups have already been created. (To view them, you must log in to Facebook or register; it's free and open to the public.)
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