Clubs reach beyond campus and into real world
By Tara Sahdev
If you're interested in a spring break trip to Honduras, Halloween carnivals and internships with Sony, new clubs have tons to offer students. Here are three new clubs that are worth looking into.
* Santa Clara Global Medical Brigades
This club is dedicated solely to sending medical supplies to Honduras. It is a branch of the Los Angeles-based Global Medical Brigades, which helps developing nations obtain adequate health care via student-led groups around the country.
"We focus on Honduras now because it is currently the poorest country in Central America," said club co-founder Sean Brachvogel.
"Its economy depends almost entirely on its agriculture, which is mostly bananas and coffee, but those crops are usually wiped away by the seasonal hurricanes."
Chemistry professor Steven Fedder inspired the organization by sending out an e-mail to his pre-med students telling them about it. GMB's main event -- a trip to Honduras during spring break -- is already in the works.
The club will pool medical resources and professionals in order to deliver supplies and help patients while in Honduras.
Contact club co-founder Sean Brachvogel at sbrachvogel@scu.edu for more information.
* SCU Rotaract
Like GMB, this club's main purpose is community service. Rotaract's motto is "fellowship through service," and right now, the club is concentrating on raising money to help end the worldwide polio epidemic.
Rotaract's first event is Pumpkins in the Park, a Halloween carnival for children. They also plan on participating in the American Cancer Society's Making Strides Against Breast Cancer walk at HP Pavilion in October.
Jessica Tuan, president of SCU Rotaract, participated in the high school version of the club, called Interact.
"We don't limit ourselves to just community service. We do a lot of district events with other clubs," says Tuan. SCU Rotaract has a social planned with the Rotaract clubs from University of California, Berkeley, and University of California, Davis.
The Rotaract club has more than 7,000 chapters in 163 different countries, which gives members lots of opportunities for social gatherings and traveling. This June, the club has an international convention in Los Angeles.
Contact club President Jessica Tuan at jtuan@scu.edu for more information.
* Association for Computer Machinery
The Association for Computer Machinery is a club for students who are considering pursuing a career in computer engineering. Its main purpose is to provide members with opportunities to network and meet other students, teachers or alumni who are interested in computer engineering.
Companies such as Sony have scheduled meetings with ACM to recruit club members for student internships and a few companies are even looking to fill full-time positions.
So far, 35 students have shown interest in the club. "We're going to make it more of like a social club. There is no reason to organize a programming competition just to separate the people who know programs from the people who don't," said ACM President Nicolas Treat.
ACM is considering a program which would allow club members to go to public high schools to talk to students about computer engineering. The club members believe that many high school students do not know what computer engineering is.
They would also like to encourage administrators to offer advanced computer classes as part of their curriculum.
Contact ACM President Nicolas Treat at ntreat@scu.edu for more information.
Contact Tara Sahdev at (408) 551-1918 or tsahdev@scu.edu.