Freshman Factor Fires Away

Paintball comes to NSU

NSU students painted the town red - and blue - as they participated in the Student Activities Board's "paintball wars." The Freshman Factor committee hosted the paintball wars Tuesday, March 18 at the football practice field from 6-8 p.m.

Unlike traditional paintball, guns were not used. Instead, each team took small pool soaker balls drenched in paint and threw them at the opposing team. In head-to-head competitions, teams ran through stacked tires and pallet obstacles while trying to safely capture the other team's flag or get all members of the other team out by hitting a person twice.

Ashley Kasperski, freshman psychology major said she got messy and gross but she had so much fun.

"I came to get messy - that's accomplished," Kasperski said.

Alicia Cox, a freshman education major, said her team did not have a good strategy when it played its first game because no one was guarding its flag. They learned from that, which led to later victories.

Although it started to rain, purple paintballers were still at the field mixing colors.

Preparation Before Play

SAB's freshman factor committee is exclusively for freshmen. The committee gives students leadership experience by teaching them how to plan events. The students in the committee then use those skills to plan their own event.The paintball war is this year's committee project. A committee of 20 students has met almost every week since October to plan the event.

Commitee Head Eddie Higginbotham, a sophomore health and exercise science major, acted as a facilitator to the group.

Students were responsible for making proposals for food items and materials needed for the paintball war. The event was essentially planned by the students and was carried out with little outside help.

This year, SAB experienced a budget cut, but the students were able to adjust.

"They rolled with the punches," Higginbotham said. "They were willing and able to make any adjustments necessary. The entire time they kept positive attitudes."

Other activities included:

• Target Practice with human targets
• Eating Contest
• "Rubber Ducky" (students tried to pull the duck with the winning numer from a pool)
• "Sandy Candy" (students filled tubes with different colored powdered candy)

Original

Freshman Factor Fires Away

NSU students painted the town red - and blue - as they participated in the Student Activities Board's "paintball wars."The Freshman Factor committee hosted the paintball wars Tuesday, March 18 at the football practice field from 6-8 p.m.

Unlike traditional paintball, guns were not used. Instead, each team took small pool soaker balls drenched in paint and threw them at the opposing team. To win the game, a team had to safely capture the other team's flag or get all members of the other team out by hitting a person twice.

"I came to get messy - that's accomplished," said freshman psychology major Ashley Kasperski.

Kasperski said she "got messy and gross, but it was so much fun."

The running and laughter of the other participants showed that they were also enjoying themselves. were all over the field, enjoying the various activities offered by SAB.

SAB set up five different stations on the sidelines of the paintball field. The target practice station allowed students to throw balls at human targets. Other stations included an eating contest station, a "rubber ducky" station at which students tried to pull the duck with the winning number from a pool and a "sandy candy" station, where students filled tubes with different colors of powdered candy.

The games were head-to-head competitions, and the winning team's members received prizes.

Alicia Cox, a freshman education major, said her team did not have a good strategy when it played its first game because no one was guarding its flag. They learned from that, which led to later victories.

SAB's freshman factor committee is exclusively for freshmen. The committee gives students leadership experience by teaching them how to plan events. The students in the committee then use those skills to plan their own event.The paintball war is this year's committee project. A committee of 20 students has met almost every week since October to plan the event.

Eddie Higginbotham, a sophomore health and exercise science major, is the freshman factor committee head; he acted as a facilitator to the group.Students were responsible for making proposals for food items and materials needed for the paintball war. The event was essentially planned by the students and was carried out with little outside help. This year, SAB experienced a budget cut, but the students were able to adjust.

"They rolled with the punches," Higginbotham said. "They were willing and able to make any adjustments necessary. The entire time they kept positive attitudes."

Stacked tires and pallets were used as obstacles and hiding places in the course.Teams, which consisted of a minimum of five people, were allowed to pre-register or just show up and play. Competition between teams was a best two-out-of-three games, but once every team had played if there was still time left, teams were allowed to play additional games. A person who did not have a team was able to join an already formed team. The games were seven minutes long.