STUDENT COUNCIL'S
SCHOOL SPIRIT T-SHIRT DESIGN

Oct. 8 update: Student Council's school spirit T-shirts are now available for sale. The shirts cost $20 each for students and faculty and will get them into home games for free. Parents may buy the shirts for $10 each, but the shirts will not get them into games for free.

Nakamura can be reached at nnakamu1-at-uni.illinois.edu.

URBANA — This year, the cheers at Uni sporting events might be a little louder.

Student Council is working on a plan to increase student support at athletic events, which includes posting weekly announcements in the hallways, creating T-shirts that would get students into home games for free, and raffles for people who attend a certain number of games.

"We were thinking during one of the StudCo meetings … that athletics is undersupported," said Student Council executive president Isaac Chambers. "Not a lot of people go to the basketball or volleyball games or other sporting events, and we wanted to increase attendance."

Weekly announcements of events are being posted on the Student Council board outside the Mac lab on the first floor.

Chambers said people would also be encouraged to attend sporting events through e-mails sent to the student body. A few other incentives are on the horizon as well.

T-shirts are being designed that would allow students to get into any home game this school year for free. Student Council will sell the shirt to students for $20. The special admissions offer does not apply to parents and faculty, but they may purchase the shirt for a reduced price of $10.

In addition, students will also be able to use punch cards to enter a raffle for prizes. Attending a home athletic event will earn a person one stamp, and attending an away event will earn a person two stamps. Each stamp is one entry in the raffle, and complete cards can earn a person bonus entries. Raffles will be held at the end of each sports season (starting with the winter season), with a larger raffle at the end of the year.

The weekly announcements are already being posted, but the T-shirts and punch cards won't be available for a while.

"We're just working on getting it implemented," said Chambers. "Right now we're working with the reward system, and that should be started probably in two or so weeks."

Some students thought the plan was good, and said they would be more likely to attend sporting events.

"I suppose it's a good idea," said junior Sian Best, "because once people have bought the shirts they'll have incentive to go. I think I'd go."

"Normally what stops me from going to sports games is the fact that you have to pay,” said senior Lizzy Warner. "So I usually only go to the free games. But with a T-shirt I would be 10 times more likely to go."

Other students were skeptical about how effective the new system would be.

"I don't know if it's the system that would encourage me to go more," senior Karen Han said. "It's more for me how much time I have free rather than the price. I was planning on attending more games this year anyway."

Athletic Director Sally Walker hopes the enthusiasm of the few spreads to the many.

"There are individuals within each class who are very supportive of their classmates and attend a wide variety of events," said Walker. "So hopefully we’ll just be able to get more and more of those kids out, they'll have fun and they'll want to come back."

Erika Belmont, Isaac Chambers, and Maritza Mestre contributed to the reporting of this article.