Today from 3:00 to 5:00 in East Halls Quad, the University Park Undergraduate Association (UPUA) will be hosting Fresh Fest, a new event to familiarize the Class of 2014 with the UPUA. Fresh Fest will feature live music, free food, speakers, and the chance to meet their student representatives, including UPUA President Christian Ragland, and many other UPUA members.

Rebecca Alt, Director of Freshmen Outreach and key organizer of the event, said the event is important because, “[UPUA members] recognize that UPUA is not a commonly known entity on campus and [we] decided that one of the most important things we need to do to change that is to reach out to freshmen.” Alt also mentioned the UPUA’s focus on helping students know, “What their student government is, who we are, and that we are accessible to them.”

The goal in showcasing student government accessibility was also alluded to by UPUA President Christian Ragland, who said he was looking forward to the chance to show students that, “Instead of waiting for them to come to us, we can go to them.” Stressing the importance of student government visibility, Ragland added that, “We cannot be true representatives and executives of UPUA if we do not go and do outreach.”

The UPUA is also using this event to encourage freshman UPUA involvement and will have applications available for the two freshman representative seats that they need to fill this year.