The Union Activities Board, the organizer of programs such as Pan-Afrikan Week, Diversity Education Week and the homecoming concert, is preparing for its upcoming installment of TUFFTalks and a new leadership team.
The board, composed of seven committees, will be undergoing a presidential change this upcoming spring election cycle. An additional 18 open positions will be up for grabs for the 2018-2019 school year, including executive vice president and committee board chairs.
Kamrie Risku, a fourth-year studying political science and sociology, currently serves as the organization’s president and will be completing her time as president with the organization’s current event installments.
“The legacy that I wanted to bring was to challenge what we were doing in a positive way and making sure every event was of the highest caliber,” Risku said. “I wanted to leave a legacy of questioning what we were doing in the past. A lot of that means hard conversations and late hours sometimes.”
Risku is preparing for upcoming TUFFTalks, run by the Speakers and Professional Development committee. The new committee is looking to provide professional opportunities for students and address important issues through its speaker series.
“We are gearing up for TUFFTalks,” Risku said. “It’s our spin on the TedX series where we have a guest lecturer that we bring in, as well as student speakers.”
UAB has seven programming committees, including the Black Students Board, Diversity Activities Board, Leisure and Recreation, Concerts and Entertainment, Films, Marketing Ambassador Committee, and Speakers and Professional Development.
“They all have a distinct way in which they program,” Risku said. “For example, while they don’t primarily focus on black students, the Black Students Board, they really try to educate on the African diaspora during Pan-Afrikan week where they try to foster community in that sense, while also educating other students.”
Risku also discussed the responsibilities of the Diversity Activities Board.
“Diversity really focuses on the broader picture; that’s why they have Diversity Education Week,” Risku said. “They can bring in as many aspects of diversity as possible while the chair can take on their own role as far as there being a group or project that the committee is interested in, while also keeping in mind how diversity is multifaceted, and figuring out how to broaden that.”
The Union Activities Board frequently hosts regular events throughout the year.
“We also like to do our recurring events like Chords and Coffee, the Trivia Nights and Karaoke so that students can consistently have something to really go to and have a community that they see every last Tuesday of the month,” Risku said. “We want to make sure we balance tradition while making sure that innovation is happening.”
Casey Brannigan, a first-year studying management, looks to her inbox to find out about Union Activities Board events throughout the month.
“I feel like I don’t really notice signs but without emails I probably wouldn’t go to as many events,” Brannigan said.
Brannigan recalled enjoying the homecoming concert hosted by UAB last October.
“I went to the 2 Chainz concert as part of the homecoming celebration and even though students had to pay for that, it was really fun,” Brannigan said. “A lot of people went to that and knew about it. I feel like a lot of the appeal to going to events surrounds the food, music and social aspects.”
There will be an upcoming TUFFTalk this Wednesday at 7 p.m. in Talley Student Union’s Stewart Theatre.
Upcoming UAB events can be seen on the online calendar found here. The application website to get involved with UAB can be found here.
