New student group seeks to provide alternative social options for students

The Alternative, a new student group on campus, aims to promote conversation about the consequences of the University’s hook-up culture and provide alternative social programming.

“The topic of the hook-up culture has become quite prominent over the last couple of years, and I feel like it’s something the campus is talking about more and more,” the club’s president, Jennifer Palmquist ’13, said, explaining that the club’s timing was motivated by the ongoing public discussion of the hook-up culture that began earlier this school year.

Group leaders described the club’s mission as two-fold, aiming both to raise awareness about the consequences of the hook-up culture and to offer alternative social events. The club’s social chair, Seth DeValve ’15, described the campus social scene as dominated by the eating clubs and explained that, while the group seeks to offer alternative social programming, it does not actively campaign against the Street.

“You’re still going to see me on the Street, and I enjoy it myself, but what you would see is me or anybody else, probably, in The Alternative maybe conducting ourselves in a certainly different way,” DeValve said. “We also believe the casual hook-up can be damaging in the long-run, and so you won’t see me pursuing that with my night on the Street … I’ll go out to be with my friends,” he added.

The Alternative held a launch party on April 12. Palmquist noted the group plans to have one more social event before the end of the year and has considered launching postering campaigns and bringing speakers to campus in the coming year.

The Alternative aims to plan several alternative, low-cost social opportunities such as games of capture-the-flag, acknowledging that events of a larger nature, such as hosting a speaker, would require more money, club treasurer Molly McBee ’14 said. The organization is looking to obtain funding through various means such as partnering with the residential colleges, SHARE or other groups outside the University with similar goals.

Founders of The Alternative said that they intend to provide a variety of events that cater to various interests.

“The events are really centered around what we used to do growing up,” DeValve said, mentioning that he hopes to organize a volleyball tournament and open-mic nights, as well as large group games such as manhunt and capture-the-flag that could be played among the eating clubs.

Not all of The Alternative’s events will be as large-scale, however. “On a micro-level, we’re going to do our best to provide even mini-things you can do with a group of eight people, like ‘Oh, we did this random thing in Princeton that was a lot of fun,’ ” the group’s vice president, Blake Thomsen ’15, said. “It’s not always going to be as many people who are involved in The Alternative all in one place.”

Approximately 75 people have signed up for the club’s listserv, according to Palmquist. Its Facebook page had 139 likes on Tuesday evening.

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Katelyn Perry ’13, who is in charge of the club’s marketing and promotions, added that all four undergraduate classes are represented in the club’s listserv following.

“One thing I was really excited about at the launch party was that we had all of the grades represented, which I feel is going to be really important in changing the culture,” Perry said. “I think to really change culture, you need to have every grade really on board with it.”