Festival of Trees brings holiday cheer to campus
Amid the twinkling lights and Christmas tree décor this holiday season, Utah State University celebrated its annual Festival of Trees tradition. Fifty clubs and organizations came together on Monday to each decorate a tree for the Festival, which lasted all week with different festivities happening each day.
Alexander Aburto, the traditions director for programming and a senior at USU, said that this year the traditions committee wanted to add more activities throughout the week to get more students involved in the holiday cheer.
Monday was decorating day where any USU club or organization could sign up to decorate a tree. Signing up was free and USU provided the trees. The clubs and organizations had to provide the decorations.
Tuesday was Giving Tuesday and was put on by USU’s advancement department. It was a day that promoted donors, and community members came and donated funds. The money that was donated will be given to the university’s clubs and organizations.
Wednesday was Christmas with the kids where students from Edith Bowen Elementary School came and participated in some activities. The younger students came in the morning and iced cookies, and some of the older students came in the afternoon and wrote letters to Santa.
Thursday was Big Blue Christmas. USU’s mascot, Big Blue, dressed as Santa and a photo booth was set up for students to come take pictures with Big Blue Santa.
Friday was pajamas and Christmas movie day. The movie “How the Grinch Stole Christmas” played in the Taggart Student Center Ballroom. Students were encouraged to wear their pajamas and bring pillows and blankets; free popcorn was provided.
On Saturday, the traditions committee teamed up with PoBev, an open mic event at USU, and they put on a special holiday edition where students came and enjoyed some holiday music and poetry.
The Festival of Trees event was not just for the students. It also gave clubs and organizations the opportunity to give back to the community. At the end of the week, Bear River Head Start program will donate the decorated trees to families in Cache Valley.
“The last couple of years we have been looking for more ways to become involved with the community, and since the majority of our members are USU students we thought we should grow our club and friendships through more USU events,” said Emma Martino, president of the USU Country Swing Dancing Club. “We want to show that we are not just all about the dancing, we like to be involved in community events as well.”
The event also allows for advertisement for different clubs and organizations.
“We really wanted to represent our President Cabinet family at USU, just to put ourselves out there and we are glad that we got the opportunity,” said Lizie Allen, a senior at USU and President Cabinet committee member.
Voting for the trees went on all week. People could vote by liking the picture of their favorite tree on USU Student Association’s Facebook page or by ballot votes where the trees have been on display in the TSC International Lounge.
Aburto said that the tree with the highest number of votes will win the People’s Choice award and be given a $100 gift card. The ballot votes will then determine which tree won for “Aggie Spirit” and which tree won for “Most Decorated.” The winners of these two trees will receive gift baskets. Winners will be announced on Saturday at PoBev.
— jillian.mccarthy@aggiemail.usu.edu