Surreal St. Louis: Members of SGA and SAB at the National Association for Campus Activities conferenceBy Kristi Cummins / Staff writer

As we stepped out of the St. Louis airport and I felt the freezing air, I knew something was wrong. We were supposed to be in the tropical, exotic land of St. Louis, Missouri. And Missouri was located somewhere in the south, like by Florida or New Orleans, right?

Wrong. Try the middle of the country. As if my geographical stupidity wasn’t enough, the change in time zones was messing with my head more than it should have. Once I had gathered myself and turned my brain back on, our trip had begun.

Six members of the Student Activities Board and the Student Government Association along with the campus director of activities, Jana Valentine, left Greensburg on Saturday Feb. 16 at 9 a.m. for St. Louis.

The National Association for Campus Activities conference was held in St. Louis this year. Alyson Galentine, Jessica Dick, Greer Snavely, Meghan Kyle, Katie Bondarenka, and I made up the group of ladies attending the conference. And if I may say so, we had a good group.

We were attending the NACA conference to learn something in the sessions that can be brought back and used on campus. Most of the sessions focus on some aspect relating to programming activities on your campus and improving your leadership skills.

The colleges who attend NACA have a chance to see talent and book them to perform. We saw so many hilarious comedians, really good bands, magicians, as well as very moving motivational speakers.

Caroline Rhea opened up the conference with stand-up comedy, and she was just so adorably funny. We also saw “Saturday Night Live” comedian Finesse Mitchell perform stand-up. Lance Bass from N*Sync give a motivational speech on being yourself.

The coolest part of the trip was meeting Dennis Haskins who played Mr. Belding on “Saved by the Bell.” He was glad to take pictures with all of us, and he also took time to get to know us and have a nice conversation. Amidst all the talk, we got him interested in coming to UPG to host the annual fashion show hosted by SAB, as well as give a motivational speech. We’re working on getting that to happen.

Overall, the trip was wonderful. Not only did we get to see lots of entertaining performers as well as book many of them to come to campus, we learned things to help us better our leadership roles on campus. And my favorite part of the trip was spending time with the wonderful girls from our school and getting to know each other even better.

Students should keep their eyes open for the acts that we saw at NACA and booked to come to campus. We definitely picked ones who we felt would be well-received by the student body.