Many students, including myself, want to get involved during our time in college, especially since it can feel lonely and boring trying to get used to a new environment and make new friends. Mississippi State University has many organizations, clubs and activities for students to participate in. Still, with so many, it can be difficult for students to figure out all the opportunities they have and how to capitalize on them.
MSU has its Cowbell Connect website, which lists all clubs and events around campus. Even with this platform, opportunities are not advertised well. In my experience, despite being well into my first semester at MSU, I am constantly learning about new organizations I have never heard of.
Many of my friends have joined groups that I would have been interested in but did not hear of until it was essentially too late. Every time I use Cowbell Connect, I see the organizations that plan to meet, but I am unsure of how to find an organization I might like when they do not hold meetings that are clearly open to new members.
More freshmen seem to discover organizations through word of mouth rather than through student resources. However, that option is not available for students who do not already have a circle of friends or people to talk with.
Kylan Stinson is a freshman Electrical Engineering major and Luckyday scholar who participates in Special Olympics and intramural flag football, but he did not discover these opportunities through Cowbell Connect or university advertisement.
“Honestly, I think if I wasn’t in Luckyday and didn’t meet the people I met I wouldn’t have found out about those opportunities,” Stinson said.
He feels that finding things to do is “moderately difficult” and that Cowbell Connect can improve on that front.
Also in Luckyday, freshman kinesiology major Joshua Devaul participates in Brickfire and Special Olympics. He joined them early in the year because he already knew to strive for them. He found himself asking around with upperclassmen in his major.
“I learned about organizations from my friends, and I had to go up and ask about them,” Devaul said as he explained his lack of use for Cowbell Connect.
The problem with Cowbell Connect is less with the website and more with its accessibility and advertisement. It is not pushed nearly enough as it could be, and many people overlook it. Many people would rather have things shown and presented to them rather than have to look for themselves.
Finding opportunities on campus is very difficult for me, and I find it unnecessarily difficult to make attempts to use different websites. Checking Cowbell Connect consistently might be easier if it were at least an app.
While I do understand that there are too many groups on campus to be individually advertised, I also do not believe that MSU is making any effort to push smaller groups on campus. Plenty of students could be interested in certain clubs if they knew they existed. Some students miss out on things they would be interested in simply because they did not know it was an option.
Noah Lagg is a freshman who enjoys working out and wrestling. Lagg knew about club wrestling at MSU, but he did not know that he could work at the Sanderson as a personal trainer as a freshman.
“Personally, I find it pretty difficult to get into clubs and organizations,” Lagg, who is majoring in electrical engineering, said. “I think Cowbell Connect is a pain, and you have to be specific with your searches to get where you want.”
While MSU does have good resources and a website that tries to give all of its organizations a voice, that should not be the only way students can keep up with and learn about our organizations. Students have many interests, and more should be done to help expose them to clubs featuring those interests.