Fall Fest 2011, beginning Friday, marks a “retrospective” weekend for the Brandeis community when parents and alumni can learn about the students’ lives on campus as well as reflect on the past, present and future of Brandeis University.
The planning committee works for about eight months to organize and perfect the schedule and theme of the weekend. This year, Fall Fest is designed to showcase the accomplishments of Brandeis, its students and its faculty, both in the past 60 years and now.
Other local Boston-area schools kick off their Fall Fests with annual football games. Boston College hosted a sold-out football game against Wake Forest last Saturday at its Parents and Family Weekend and Tufts University is hosting a football game against Amherst College this Saturday for its Fall Fest. Brandeis will be also be hosting a variety of sports games this weekend including a Quidditch tournament.
“Fall Fest at Brandeis is truly unique,” Serafina Amarilio ’12, the on-campus programming coordinator for Fall Fest, said. “It is designed to bring students and families together through many types of events. This way, we differ from other schools whose parents weekends are centered around sports, since we offer a variety of options: social, academic, and everything in between.”
Parents are encouraged to sit in on a range of classes, from physiology to jazz ensemble. According Amarilio parents not only attend classes their child is taking, but also ones that relate to their profession, or sound different and interesting. This year, Brandeis has a list of 115 classes from which parents can choose.
Thursday evening, guests and students enjoyed a concert by the Naravasa Dance Theater, followed by a tour through the acclaimed Rose Art Museum, which has reopened its doors to celebrate its 50th anniversary. Parents can also attend Shabbat services, shows, a haunted castle tour and sports games in order to experience life at Brandeis.
Amarilio said that Brandeis’ small size makes it is easier for the Fall Fest core committee to get to know individual families and make the weekend more personal. “It is also easier to plan events for and manage a database of about 250 families, rather than a larger amount, which would be harder to control,” said Amarilio.
