The Living Learning Communities transformed into different countries and even opened a stock market for a global block party Sunday evening.
hannah whitaker | courtesy
The Living Learning Communities hosted its Global Block Party March 24. Students who attended the Global Block Party received a passport at the 24-hour desk that provided details on which LLC was which country, together with a space for a stamp from each country. Completed passports and paper exports could be traded in at the 24-hour desk for tickets into a prize drawing.
“Part of the goal of the LLCs for us is to get the different buildings involved with each other and to do something fun that shows what the LLC’s have to offer,” Michelle Yeager, a resident assistant for the College of Natural Resources LLC, said. “It’s a chance for people to learn about places other than America. Like maybe you didn’t get the chance to study abroad so maybe you can collect some of that knowledge through some of the other activities on campus.”
People who attended the Global Block Party received a passport at the 24-hour desk that provided details on which LLC was which country, together with a space for a stamp from each country.
For example, the Gault LLC was Jamaica. When students visited each country, they could win paper slips that had the exports from each country. For instance, the paper export prize won from Gault was alcohol.
Completed passports and paper exports could be traded in at the 24-hour desk for tickets into a prize drawing. Some of the potential prizes included a TV, Nintendo Wii, Nintendo DS, various cooking supplies and two mystery boxes. Newly added to the party this year was an economy system, which made different exports of countries worth more at different times.
The economic system started at 7:30 p.m. and went until 8:30 p.m., with the value of exports changing approximately every 20 minutes. A good would change in price when a fictional war would break out between LLCs and cause a fictional shortage of that particular export. For instance, a war between Gault and another LLC would cause the ticket value of alcohol to increase for a set amount of time. This could make rum worth three tickets instead of one if it was traded in at the 24-hour desk in that particular time slot.
“So it’s kind of a way to get people thinking of the value of different things and the reasons why prizes change on items,” Yeager said. “So it gives students a different way to look at the global economy.”
Students seemed to embrace the economic systems, with much shouting and communicating going on between groups in order to maximize ticket potential.
“The way I went about it is I kept everything that wasn’t worth three until the next time around so I got three for all of my commodities at the end,” Amanda Eagle, UI senior, said.
Each LLC was decorated to look like the country they were representing, food from the country and games from the country. The Upham LLC was Italy, so Upham had Italy’s colors decorating the walls, an opportunity for students to win exports by playing bocce ball and carbonara for students to eat. Each country presented different food, decorations, and a game for students to enjoy.
“Japan had this one where you make your own origami ninja star, then you have to throw them at balloons at the wall since you can’t actually have sharp objects. But that one was fun since you got to make your own ninja star,” Michelle Kissik, UI junior said.
The night ended at 9 p.m. when students gathered in a classroom by the 24-hour desk to see if they had won anything. After the winners were announced, one mystery box was revealed to contain a ball of yarn while the other contained a camera.
Aleya Ericson can be reached at [email protected]