The Kinesiology Students’ Society intent on making the student experience special

In September, new Kinesiology students are usually attending KinCamp, a camp where students take part in activities like walking high ropes while getting to know classmates, often forming lasting friendships. Kinesiology Students’ Society (KSS) executive host this event and many others throughout the year – most of them involving lots of activity. This year, the pandemic has the executive rallying to move the events online.  

“Our focus used to be getting students together in-person, but since we can’t do that now, we want to find new ways to create a community and make this a special year for Kinesiology students. We’ve had to be inventive,” says Belicia Macias, president of the KSS.

“With some events we could move them online quite easily, but with Kindustry we really had to change how it would be offered,” says Macias.

Normally for Kindustry, the KSS invite 50 plus alumni and other industry professionals to set up display booths where they can talk to current and potential Kinesiology students about career options. The event is attended by almost 200 students each year.

“Kindustry is like the A to Z of kinesiology. We have acupuncturists, biomechanists, chiropractors, dance instructors, exercise physiologists, firefighters, and on and on. This year, we had to limit the number of presenters, but we hope to expand back to our regular list next year,” says Madison Grande, VP of Academic who had a large role in organizing Kindustry.

“We also hosted the event online over five days, two hours per day, and we had presenters from specific streams of kinesiology speak each night. For example, one night we would focus on exercise physiology, or medicine or graduate studies,” says Grande.

Most evenings, Kindustry was attended by about 25 to 30 students, with the KSS moderating the event, which included introducing the speakers and organizing the questions to prevent duplication.

Dr. Tyler Cluff, an assistant professor in the Faculty of Kinesiology and the KSS’s faculty liaison, notes the executive team have been creative.

“I’m impressed with the KSS. They’ve done a fantastic job in re-thinking events to bring them online,” says Cluff.

Dr. Jonathan Smirl, also an assistant professor and KSS faculty liaison in Kinesiology, echoes the sentiment.

“I am extremely proud of the KSS for their ability to adapt to our 'new normal' as a result of COVID 19 and provide a very valuable resource for our student body. Being able to transition to a brand new online format and deliver a very high-quality program demonstrates how industrious and resilient our students are.”

Some events are not as well attended as usual, but others such as the peer tutoring program are maintaining the same number of students as last year.

“We know it’s not the same doing events online, but it’s something the students are still really happy with,” says Macias.

For more information about KSS, follow them on social media @kssucalgary.

The KSS executive for the 2020/21 academic year is: Belicia Macias, president; Emily Gushulak, VP administration; Madison Grande, VP academic; Sophia Lederhos, VP events; Lauren Mitchell, VP finance; MJ Pickell, VP public relations; Matthew Lamiel and Madison Boulanger, VP KinGames and Kinmunity; and Eliane Uhuegbulem and Tailynn Chang, JR executives. Elections are held in March.