WOW events canceled after Isaac

Week of Welcome (WOW) has become an annual tradition at USF, but due to Tropical Storm Isaac last week numerous WOW events were canceled.


Due to the closing of the Tampa campus and cancellation of classes, 17 scheduled WOW events were affected Monday, including the Welcome Back Picnic hosted by Student Government (SG) and campus welcome tents that typically are used as direction points for new students.


“This is the first time we’ve had WOW affected by rain,” Keri Riegler, director of New Student Connections, said. “These are decisions we made with the interests of students involved.”


Though some organizations had spent months planning their events, they were disrupted in a relatively short amount of time once classes were officially canceled.


“When it was announced that the university would be closed, we communicated the options to organizations,” Riegler said.


Organizations hosting a WOW event could reschedule their event after Sept. 4, cancel it entirely or re-submit it for the spring semester’s WOW.


“There wasn’t the capacity to add some events later that week,” she said.


For student organizations that had already spent money on their events, those funds were lost.


The New Student Connections office receives Activity and Service (A&S) service fee funding for WOW events that the office throws specifically, as well as for
general marketing of WOW, Riegler said. However, events thrown by individual organizations are funded by A&S fees allocated to individual organizations or other
resources.


Student body President Brian Goff, said if organizations canceled ahead of time and received refunds, those funds would still be available for them. However if they were not refunded, there isn’t anything SG can do to help them.


“If they spent the money, we can’t give them additional funding,” Goff said.


Despite event cancellations, Tropical Storm Isaac and the Republication National Convention, Riegler said this semester’s WOW was a success.


“It seems that students were still out and about and enjoying the activities,” Riegler said. “There was wonderful turnout.”