Two students reached out to United Student Government (USG) Monday, seeking approval for a new club to begin in the upcoming fall semester.
Freshmen Patty Sorg, a criminal justice major, and Mackenzie Sugrue, a mass communications major, petitioned to approve Pay it Forward, a group which will focus on community service jobs around the city. USG approved this club, which will begin to develop now, but start in fall 2015.
Co-President Sorg and Vice President Sugrue explained that they plan to differ from other groups on campus. While certain clubs tend to focus more strictly on the University, they plan to venture outside the school’s borders.
“What we want to do is kind of go out into the Pittsburgh community and not as much Point Park,” Sorg said. “Obviously, we want our students to be involved as much as they can, but we want to step off of Boulevard of the Allies, get away from Wood Street and just work on the Pittsburgh community as a whole.”
Pay it Forward’s long-term plan for next semester, and future semesters, involves tree planting, animal shelter visits and nursing home visits. They also incorporate a specific event called the Bag it Forward series.
“What this does is have different bags students can make to go to homeless shelters or women’s shelters, children in hospitals, or animal hospitals, and that’s basically what we are all about,” Sorg said.
Pay it Forward is a group that will grow partially from members of the Campus Activities Board (CAB) due to the future cut of the community service section. CAB’s administrators realized that the community service within the club was not getting the attention that it deserved, and therefore needed to be let go.
“CAB really loves community service and the message behind it. They just couldn’t do it any longer because they were not getting much attendance to the events,” Sorg said.
Sorg and Sugrue hope the word will spread about their new club. With help from social media and word of mouth, the two hope students get involved in their events.
“Social media will really help, and we have just been trying to get people involved. Just by people coming to events now for CAB, we are getting the word out about what we are doing,” Sugrue said.
With the cancellation of community service, CAB plans to add a new section: pioneer series. The organization will put on different programs, four continuous series that will happen each month, and will feature new themes to attract programs that the students desire.
Although no events have yet to be confirmed, the group aspires for success. The two plan to finish out their work with CAB and leave on a good note with the club.
“We don’t have anything set in stone yet since we are just getting started, but we are going to have so many different smaller events, and with the connections we have with CAB, we hope to be successful,” Sorg said.
Because it will not begin until next semester, Pay it Forward will not be seeking money for the next funding period that begins this week. According to USG Treasurer Thaddeus Covaleski, the finance committee meetings for the clubs are underway and continue until Thursday. USG hopes to have their next funding meeting Mar. 16.
Back in Jan., they allocated $21,621 to the 32 clubs. Only $7,500 of what was given out was spent this first funding period, so the remaining $14,059 will be added to the second period.
“Because of the money added to this second funding period from the first, we are looking at around the same amount as we gave out in January,” Covaleski said.
