The University of Manitoba Students’ Union’s annual Celebration Week will see events happening across campus with hopes of creating a festive feel amid the winter chill.
Events were held last week at the Bannatyne campus and are being held this week at the Fort Garry campus. The annual budget of $50,000 was approved through UMSU Council last April.
This year’s week include outdoor activities such as broomball tournaments on the new outdoor ice rink, as well as guest speakers including former NHL player Theo Fleury, who spoke on Monday to a packed multi-purpose room, Sue Johanson, a sex educator and media personality, and Jamie Tworkowski, founder of the non-profit organization “To Write Love on Her Arms.”
The GSA Lounge will house an Asian Movie Festival in the evenings and Degrees will be hosting nightly events as well. A summer-themed social featuring the Lytics will be held on Friday in the MPR.
This year will mark the 41st anniversary of Celebration Week. Although the week has varied in content over the years, UMSU president Heather Laube said the goal has remained the same — to celebrate life and learning through education and entertaining speakers and events.
“We usually hear a great deal of positive feedback from those who are able to make it out to the events. The speakers are usually some of the best-attended events in the entire year, and we think that this year will be no exception,” she said.
According to Laube, the UMSU Council and Executive began brainstorming for the events during the summer months and tried to finalize major booking by mid-November.
“We are fortunate to have a full-time events coordinator to oversee the planning process and to provide continuity from year-to-year when dealing with the various aspects of event planning,” said Laube.
Laube said UMSU expects to have capacity or near capacity crowd at the events, given the great deal of interest from students and the university community. Seating capacity for all speaker events in the MPR is around 1,000. Live-feed overflow areas will be set up in campo area of University Center.
Ronnie Cruz, a fourth-year Human Ecology student at the U of M, has attended UMSU Celebration week for a number of years and is looking forward to this year’s guest speakers.
“I think the week is a really good idea,” she said. “It gives students the chance to enjoy the campus life, especially now that it’s slowly getting more stressful.”
Samara Luprypa, a U of M student and Peers volunteer said she is most excited for Sue Johanson’s lecture.
“As part of Peers’ outreach program, we’ll be talking about safe sex, so we’re all planning on attending that talk in case we can gain knowledge that we can pass on during Peers’ outreach week,” she said.
