As moms flock to Athens this weekend, Ohio University has planned dozens of events to provide wholesome family entertainment to keep the parent-child duos off of Court Street.
At least 30 university events are planned to engage and entertain OU moms from Friday night to Sunday afternoon.
“It’s important for us to provide students with opportunities for them to do things to engage their parents while they’re here,” said Andrew Holzaepfel, associate director of the Campus Involvement Center. “Variety is important, so we want lots of different options and lots of different kinds of things.”
These options include dinner theater, an African dance performance, an improvisational comedy event and a walk to raise funds to cure breast cancer.
The Dean of Students office has worked closely with the Involvement Center to either provide or raise awareness of a diverse number of events geared toward moms, said Chad Barnhardt, coordinator of parent outreach and special projects.
“The events that we have on the site are those that are university affiliated but we know there are lots of community events going on as well that we would encourage moms to go to,” he said. “(I’m) looking forward to see how moms respond to coming in April.”
Though OU does not have a reliable estimate of how many moms come to campus for the weekend, Barnhardt believes the weekend is good for the local economy.
“We know moms are staying in Lancaster, Parkersburg and Logan for the weekend. We don’t have a good estimate on the full number of hotel rooms in Athens,” Barnhardt said. “100 residence hall rooms (we designated for moms) sold out on campus within an hour.”
Emma Clark, a graduate assistant for parent outreach at OU, has reached out to student organizations that are now contacting her constantly about new events happening on campus for moms.
“In University Programming Council, I was the university event chair so I planned the moms walk and the special weekends that are on campus,” Clark said. “I really enjoyed it and these are the big weekends where we have a lot of family and parents that come.”
dd195710@ohiou.edu
