On Sept. 1, students received an email from President Ian Baucom announcing two new initiatives: Midd Saturdays and Midd@Night. Both programs aim to provide a variety of new activities for students and staff alike. Midd Saturdays hosts events, per its name, every Saturday, and Midd@Night will take place on Thursday and Friday nights. As stated in President Baucom’s email, the project has “the simple goal of providing opportunities for students to be together, have fun together, and find joy together.”
Vice President for Student Affairs Smita Ruzicka, spoke on the motivations behind the initiative:
“We’ve been receiving a lot of feedback from students over the past five years around programming on campus and the challenges for students to have late night programming options over the weekends. We’ve known about this for a while, but having now it be a priority in our strategic plan has really given us the impetus to be able to say ‘okay, let’s put our resources behind this,’” Ruzicka said in an interview with The Campus.
Events will take place across campus, ranging from the college’s numerous athletic facilities to the McCullough Student Center, along with off-campus locations like the Snowbowl or Lake Dunmore.
Another aim of the project is to bring the campus community closer to the town and local areas. One of the events on the calendar is MiddPride which will take place in downtown Middlebury on Oct. 10th and is organized by The Teen Center, an organization based in the town. The Middlebury Mountain Club will collaborate with the administration in an upcoming event, where they will take students to each one of the 46 high peaks of the Adirondack mountains. The Mountain Club will not be the only student organization working together with the administration on future events, according to Ruzicka.
“Our plan is to collaborate with student groups to get feedback from students to build on that programming, and one of the things, again around Midd@Night specifically, is we’re also hoping to hire — we are in the midst of hiring — students to be able to run those programs because we know peer-to-peer programming is much more effective than what we think is cool to do” Ruzicka said.
Beyond student clubs, the administration is working closely with the Better Middlebury Partnership, a nonprofit organization focusing on engagement, advocacy for local businesses and making Middlebury a better place for its citizens. The Better Middlebury Partnership is helping the college think about how to create stronger partnerships in the town, on top of ones that already exist like MiddKid Night —a college-organized celebration mid-winter featuring performances, hot chocolate and food trucks that invites students to come into town, to take place.
Some events aim to foster a space for students to meet and spend time with Middlebury alumni as well. During homecoming weekend, for example, the school is organizing a glow-in-the-dark roller rink in Wilson Hall, as well as fall foliage rides and an artisan market at the Snowbowl.
Traditional employee events will continue, including an apple picking excursion, an employee barbecue and an event at the Snowbowl in January. In addition, the administration’s goal is to create spaces where students, faculty and staff can all come together.
“I think students really love to see faculty and staff outside the classroom. Faculty and staff love to interact with students outside the classroom or work. So we’re bringing back something that was a tradition here pre-COVID, which is the all-campus picnic and barbecue. We’re going to have it twice a year,” Ruzicka said. “The goal is to have events for employees and really market the existing ones, but then also to expand events that can include employees as well as students.”
The administration has set aside a certain budget for the initiative this year, but is still looking for ways to organize a sustainable budget for what they say will be a multi-year project.
One major expense — food trucks — will feature prominently at events this year.
“Because this is the first year we’re piloting doing a lot of food trucks, we’re doing different things. Like for some Saturdays, we’re saying the first 100 people get free food, and then after that, people have to pay. Long term, I think I would love to explore how we can have food trucks and that be counted as a [dining hall] swipe for students,” Ruzicka explained.
Some events, like the upcoming roller rink, will be held in smaller spaces. These, as Ruzicka said, will only be open to a limited number of students.
“We are going to absolutely abide by our occupancy rules and our safety pieces. We’re going to advertise [some events] as first come first serve. If we see that there is a high demand, while in the moment we may have disappointed students, that’ll give us some really important information that this is something students want, and so we’ll make sure to bring that program back,” she explained.
The initiatives — especially Midd@Night — have the goal of improving campus life for students.
“We want to do things that are low effort, consistent cost, but have high impact. Those are our goals with Midd@Night. Things that students don’t have to plan in advance or even register for. We’re trying to do consistent events on consistent days,” Ruzicka said, adding that the goal is for students to know that there always is an event they can attend every Thursday and Friday night.
Ryan Hertzog ’27 said that he appreciates the convenience of the initiative.
“I’m very excited that there’s like just stuff to go to that’s on campus, that’s close by and not a big commitment to go to and just hang out with your friends. That’s perfect,” Hertzog said in an interview with The Campus.
While the idea behind the initiative is to bring the community together, Victoria Perez Hidalgo ’27, mentioned that students go through “choice fatigue,” especially when multiple events are happening at the same time. She emphasized the importance of understanding students from different backgrounds and representing their perspectives.
“I hope they do it in a way that’s not dividing, and that they do take students’ perspectives into consideration when planning movie nights and stuff, to make sure they can provide diverse sources of material, looking beyond the U.S.,” Perez Hidalgo, an international student, said in an interview with The Campus.
The schedule of events is available on a new website for students. The project is open to student feedback, and while there will likely be no formal surveys, Ruzicka said that the administration is hoping to receive in-person feedback during the events instead.
