Stuyvesant Hosts Its Historic Fall 2024-2025 Clubs and Pubs Fair

The Student Union (SU) hosted its fall Clubs and Pubs Fair from September 18 to September 20. 240 clubs were showcased across the third, fourth, fifth, and sixth floor, making this Clubs and Pubs Fair the largest in Stuyvesant’s history. The scale of this event required intense coordination within the Clubs and Pubs Department and promotional preparation amongst club leaders.

The Clubs and Pubs Department took two weeks to plan the fair. One week was dedicated to designing a brand-new map, as the maps from previous years contained significant flaws. “The maps that were used in the past are old building blueprints that are outdated, poorly designed, and hard to read. It’s more about deciding to make a brand new map to make it easier,” senior and Clubs and Pubs member Muhib Muhib said. 

After the SU received immense backlash for prioritizing well-established clubs amidst a crisis of having limited space during last year’s fair, the Club and Pubs Department was determined to set their standards higher this year. Clubs and Pubs Director Adeline Sauberli directed her attention to the feedback form she created last year to improve upon past mistakes. “[Last year], I knew that a lot of things had not gone as ideally as they had been. I knew I wanted to send out a feedback form […] I noticed the main two things were not having a spot and the other thing was that people were in spots that were not ideal, which was a bigger, more complicated problem,” Sauberli said.

With each day of the fair, the Clubs and Pubs Department worked tirelessly to assess weaknesses and adjust accordingly. “This year, we weren’t done when the fair started. We had to spend each day assessing what we could do for the next day. It was absolutely very hands-on,” Sauberli said. “[On the] first day, my focus was checking up on what was happening at each club.” 

This year, the Clubs and Pubs Department strived to increase students’ exposure to smaller clubs through a strategic floor layout. “We came up with the idea, as a collective, to put the bigger clubs at the end of the hallways so people, if they recognized these clubs’ names, would explore these pathways,” Sauberli said. 

Nonetheless, some clubs still experienced less traffic-flow at their allocated spot due to their distance from the main hallways. “We were also given a really inconvenient location in the hallway of the robotics lab, where not many people were going,” sophomore and StuyZines co-president Jaima Zara said. 

Consequently, club leaders have expressed their desire for more transparency from the SU in regards to how the placement of clubs is decided. “I feel like, at the end of the day, some clubs are going to end up disadvantaged because they’re put in the cafeteria—like all the way in the back of the cafeteria,” senior and Bridging Seas Executive Director Mai Tran said. “However, I think a little more transparency on how the Clubs and Pubs department decides to group clubs together and how the decision process is regarding the positioning of clubs would be great.”

Another pressing issue this year was the availability of tables during all three days of the fair.  “[There was] quite a big table shortage. Last year, there were around 100 tables, [and] this year [there were] only 30 [tables] as [...] the Battery Park City Corporation owns them and was using them,” Muhib said. 

The shortage of tables highlighted the much wider issue of the lack of communication between the SU and clubs. “There was no organization behind who had a table or who didn’t, which needs a discussion of if we should have tables first come first serve or making sure clubs like art clubs that have to display [...] and how we communicate with them,” Sauberli said. 

Hosting this fair was only made possible due to the collaboration between the SU, clubs, school administration, and the custodial team, who stayed late to clean the building. As the annual fair expands to accommodate for the growing number of clubs at Stuyvesant, more collaboration with janitors is necessary. “We need to communicate better [...] with people who leave their desks out in the hallways. That is something we could make a bit more friendly […] building a relationship with the custodians […] The problem is when you want to introduce more clubs, you need to add more floors,” Sauberli said. 

Well-established and prominent clubs such as Stuyvesant’s Key Club were featured at the fair. “It was very fun meeting new members, and it was so cool seeing different grades and how they were interested in volunteering and getting involved in the community,” junior and Stuyvesant Key Club Co-Secretary Juliet Badillo Flores said. 

Overall, the Clubs and Pubs Fair proved to be a dynamic and engaging event, giving both newly and well-established clubs a chance to connect with students. Despite the challenges that they may have faced, the fair brought together a range of clubs, making it a key event in fostering student engagement throughout the school year. 

As this fall’s Clubs and Pubs Fair has concluded, the SU is already looking for ways to fuel engagement for future club fairs. “[We can] switch up the style [and] definitely make sure that any clubs that got less favorable spots can change it up. Maybe we can consider moving people around day-to-day or scrambling the map. Another [idea] is developing a game plan to deal with empty sections. I really want to have a scavenger hunt with some type of prize,” Sauberli said. “The main thing is, I want to engage club leaders more and earlier.”