MOST OUTSTANDING ORGANIZATION NOMINEE
loyola asian student organization (LASO)
What are the purpose and goal(s) of your organization, and how has it met or exceeded those goals?
LASO’s goals were having an increase in membership, membership retention, having more events, having a more noticeable presence on campus, and being more involved with GC. LASO planned one event per month, which is more than they had done in previous years. On average we had about 20 people attend. During each event, eboard made efforts to interact with each person who attended to gain membership retention. The consistent attendance showed our efforts were prevailed. Also we were able to recruit 2 members who have been to multiple events to become our interns. We also recruited another general member to apply for an Eboard position. As you know, Loyola is a very small school, but its asian community is even stronger. This year, to really promote LASO, we went to several tabling events (lasted 1-3 hours) held on campus including: freshman recruitment (August), fall student org fair (September), Sneaux (December)- assisted children creating paper lanterns, Homecoming Week- passed out Boba (January), Spring Get involved Fair (For Loyola Students) February, Spring student org Fair (For High School Students) February, Multi cultural Fair- passed out fortune cookies
LASO has become more involved with GC this past year. We attended LRX, at which we met so many amazing people from the region. We also participated in Talent Auction. This was the first time in three years where LASO members participated in the dance portion. Also almost all of our events had other attendance from other schools.
Address how your organization was outstanding in the following areas: recruitment, marketing, outreach to campus community, use of resources, officer training and event planning.
We tabled at several org fairs and promoted our next event. Student Life and Ministry printed out fliers for our events, and we passed them out to students at the org fairs. This allowed for a short introduction to LASO at these tabling events. We were more active on social media by promoting an event a week before. Promoting an event 1 week prior was best for us, so people would not forget. Eboard spread the news to all their classmates. SLM and GC even promoted our events on their instagram.Our marketing strategies were very useful considering the high rate of attendance. Something Loyola does that is not common is we can receive allocations for events. These allocations must be submitted 3 week prior to the event, thus meaning eboard would have to start planning an event ~1month before. The allocations were very useful, but it definitely did force us to start planning events far in advance. We also reached out to local restaurant owners. For our fried rice sale, we reached out to Pho Bang and August Moon for donations. All the money made was able to go to GC and CPP. For officer training, we felt LRX was the best training experience. Since most of our eboard was able to attend we gained a deeper understanding of what it means to be in. our position. For event planning, the general process was for our first meeting we would brainstorm ideas and dates for our next event. The room requests would be submitted after this meeting. The next meeting we would start providing more details, ie. materials, roles, snacks. The final meeting (usually the week of) we would finalize everything and discuss report times.
How did the organization work together to maximize strengths and overcome weaknesses?
We held regular meetings to gain popular opinions for events. Our secretary kept a detail log of what everyone’s assigned tasked were for events. This way there was no confusion of whose roles.
Provide specific examples of how the student group demonstrated growth and development in the 2023-2024 academic year.
Looking at attendance compared to last year, LASO has grown exceptionally. Max amount of people that would attend our events last year was maybe 10. Now our average for attendees is 20. We are noticing new faces and familiar faces at our events. This shows that LASO will continue to grow and a legacy will be left behind. Personal development: Most of our eboard is new, so starting off was a little difficult. For example, our EVP was completely new to GC, so he did not have anyone’s contact info nor names. Attending LRX allowed him to meet people and exchange numbers along with other eboard members. He was able to coordinate with the region to help organize TA. Our treasurer was a little unsure of how to apply for allocations, but he arranged a meeting to understand the process and the form. Now he feels comfortable applying for them.