MOST OUTSTANDING ORGANIZATION NOMINEE
university of south alabama vietnamese student association (USA VSA)
What are the purpose and goal(s) of your organization, and how has it met or exceeded those goals?
The Vietnamese Student Association at the University of South Alabama during the 2023-2024 year went in with one purpose and one goal in our mind, which was to give our all for our members, and make our club bounce back from the year prior. This proved to be very difficult, as last year did not end too well. There were many crucial mistakes, unorganized events/fundraisers, and internal problems that lead to our members having a hard time trusting the organization. But this year, the entire executive board pulled through in exceeding these goals by giving our club one of its best years since it was reestablished back in 2020. Giving our all for our members is just an understatement of the work we put in to ensure the satisfaction of our members.
“I have seen my e-board grow and develop since they first stepped foot in VSA. As President, it was an honor to work with each of them and to see how willing they were to make our members happy. Making sure everybody was heard and listened to. To make those connections and to reach out to those who were hesitant. My e-board showed me why I joined VSA in the first place and why I continue to be part of VSA… and I couldn’t be any happier with how well they did..” - Sebastian Bustamante, USA VSA President 2023-2024.
This organization on campus means more than what our e-board and our members will ever know. The impact they will leave behind, their interactions, their friendships, and more. Everything they have done for the club is exactly why we are VSA. Not just Vietnamese. We are diverse. We are inclusive. We are welcoming. We are VSA. We are a family that loves and cherishes our members. It was our goal to make everyone happy, and we are confident to say the least that we accomplished this goal and have left a legacy for future generations to follow in these footsteps to continue making VSA a happy place for those to come.
Address how your organization was outstanding in the following areas: recruitment, marketing, outreach to campus community, use of resources, officer training and event planning.
Our organization had reached new heights that we all worked extremely hard for. It took efforts from our entire club rather than just the e-board, which is something we are proud of. By letting our club feel included and special, it helped us go above and beyond in these following areas.
In regards to recruitment, our e-board AND members pushed past our own personal boundaries to reach out to others and get their interest. We have pushed for recruiting people through the club at various club days at our school and through our meetings, but what I believe our school excels at is talking with people personally and intimately. In this way, people are more inclined to join our club when we show them how friendly and how welcoming we are through personal connections and friendships.
When it comes to marketing, we have made several graphics each semester that have been appealing and attractive to the audiences we reach out and even those we do not reach out to. When it comes to our graphics, our goal isn’t just to invoke interest for our events but also invoke interest in our club by getting people to slowly open to our club.
For outreach to our campus community, it has been a little different compared to last year. Although we were unable to have a Cultural Night Market where we collaborated with other cultural clubs in the community, we instead participated more in showing our support at other club’s events and meetings! With this, we hope to continue building a strong relationship with these other clubs so that we can keep connecting and showing support to those on campus with us.
Coming into this school year, our VSA had a little bit more resources than what we had the previous year. But something that was different was how we utilized it. In order to give back more to our members, we lowered our member fees and gave back to our members to encourage them to join our club and participate in our activities. This allowed us to have people play in our intramural sports and bring in people to come to our events. We utilized the funds we raised for the club and put that towards our events and for our members. This year, we are still planning on getting our members sweatshirts and our seniors' stoles.
Our officers were more than prepared and trained for this year. Most of us had experience in prior years working within the e-board. This helped us show the newer officer members how to excel in their position and ultimately, this helped us exceed our goals for our club. Additionally, we brought in interns this spring semester and taught them well in each position. Two of our interns have applied to the upcoming board and were voted into their respective positions. As a board and thinking of our organization, we could not be any prouder of having these two step up after working extensively with the e-board and learning how the club works through our leaders.
Lastly, event planning was a collaborative effort that could not have been done without the hard work and dedication by the e-board and interns. Throughout this year, we prepared for each of our events and executed each one almost flawlessly. With our experiences and mistakes from last year, we learned to improve on what we lacked and were able to have each event turn out the way we wanted and more. It wasn’t easy working with everyone’s busy schedule, but whenever it came to the task, our board was confident and prioritized our events, which is something we could give back to our community.
How did the organization work together to maximize strengths and overcome weaknesses?
Our organization maximized our strengths and overcame our weaknesses by getting our club involved with every aspect of our VSA. Last year, we felt that our members were blindsided and were not as involved. But this year, we made a difference and worked together as not e-board and general members, but as family in VSA. Our events and activities could not have been done without the help of the ENTIRE club. Everyone did their part in showing up and showing out when the time called. We had an overflow of volunteers help at our events and that is thanks to our club for being so open and welcoming to others.
People felt comfortable asking to help us and wanting to be part of the process. This made us extremely happy because last year, it felt like people helped because we asked them to, but this year, it felt like we all wanted to achieve the same goals, and we all worked together to make the club shine and succeed.
Provide specific examples of how the student group demonstrated growth and development in the 2023-2024 academic year.
In this year alone, there were several times where our student group demonstrated growth and development in ways that astonished everyone.
Example 1) Near the beginning of the year, half of our e-board attended a leadership workshop day that was hosted by the Multicultural Leadership Council. This workshop day allowed our e-board members to grow and nurture their leadership skills that were reflected in their respective e-board roles.
Example 2) Compared to last year, our club became more involved around campus and participated in other cultural clubs’ events and meetings. This is an example of growth because it shows how open and willing to support our members were. Several occasions where this happened include the Filipino Cultural Society’s Halo Halo fundraiser, MSA’s Ramadan, and several of their meetings throughout the year.
Example 3) As an entire club, we were able to execute our biggest event on campus, our Lunar New Year’s Festival, which we were not able to do last year. Of all the achievements our club has accomplished this year, this one is the biggest because of the long months of planning and preparation leading up to this event. In order to perfect and guarantee its success, our e-board spent countless sleepless nights, 2-3 hour long meetings, and multiple connections and communications to everybody we could contact for help (including restaurants, sponsors, fan dancers, lion dancers, and more).
Example 4) In this 2023-2024 academic school year, we have popped out with several new events that were unheard of in years prior. These events include Brushes and Broth, Top Golf Night, Unity Picnic (collab event with USM) and more. These events wouldn’t have been possible if it weren’t for the efforts of our e-board and participation from our club. By gaining interest and pushing for member input, we were able to have more events this year that were successful and people found to be very fun. We hope to continue these events as our VSA is continuously growing and developing to higher levels.