How to start a Computer Science/Programming club in College?

Question

Hey guys, I am a computer science student "at some university" and am quite appalled at the lack of CS/programming clubs on my campus. We have an ACM presence but ideally what I am looking for is a place for CS students to hang out, maybe work on some projects and generally just socialize. We also do not have an actual lounge, as opposed to other majors which adds to the problem.

Next semester I am hoping to try to create a CS club, and maybe also get some pressure to actually get us a lounge. This is where you come in, I'm not the most creative or plan-ahead guy so I would really like some advice on the following matters:

1. How to actually get this club/lounge started, what channels to go through or who to talk to.

2. When the club actually get started, what advice would you guys to keep it afloat? This includes how to attract members, what activities to do (see below for my current ideas), where to get funding, how to keep members etc.

Right now for activities, I have some but not enough ideas. Ideally, I would want the club to be accessible to all Freshmen - Seniors, and would like everyone to be working on some fun project. Now i know for everyone it seems Fun = Games so I was thinking something like pygame projects, python is easy enough for even Freshmen to learn which influenced my thinking.

I would also like to have some guest speakers come in from companies or professors or even other students, but I realize this might not be able to happen unless the club actually shows promise and gets off of its feet, so advice here would also be appreciated.

I guess the end goal for me is to have a club/place to hang out on campus where CS students can centralize, meet new people, learn from other people, work on a project and make new connections. I think it would really boost the department if people got serious about it and would give some comp sci students a much needed social boost ;).

Thank you in advance for the ideas/advice!

Answer 1

Most universities usually have an official channel to go through for starting up a club on campus. This is usually done the university's Students Union, Student Council, or whatever its called at your university. So, I would suggest starting by talking to them. Where I went to university I think there was actually a position in the SU specifically for dealing with clubs administration, and I know that the university provided funding for all sanctioned clubs. For funding, you could also charge a small membership fee.

When you have your club up and running, there a few things I could think of that could help. IMO the major thing is to stay persistent and try to keep everyone informed and involved. I was actually very disappointed at my CS club/society. Every year they would start out full of ideas, but in the end it just turned out to the executives and there close friends hanging out and pretty much using the club to pad their resume.

For social events and what not, LAN parties are always fun. And to add to the fun you could challenge other departments, like engineering or math to friendly competitions, via a LAN party or any other kind of challenges, like perhaps fundraising competitions for local charities.

You could also host exam reviews as well as approach faculty to open up their research to students to show the students all the cool stuff going on at your school, and give the students a chance to get to know each other as well as the staff in your department.

Like you mentioned, guest speakers are usually a good idea, that its usually not too hard to find interesting people to come and talk to a group of interested students. You could start by looking at alumni.

Hope this helps.

Answer 2

Make sure to set up an online calendar and keep it current. Automatic reminders are a good thing too for those members that sign up for them. My CS club from my college years just figured this out and attendance has gone way up. Apparently everyone kept forgetting or never knew when and where the events were.

Answer 3

Clubs are a strange American college phenomenon. Everywhere else, the geeks just gather automatically in the computer lab.

As someone mention, you would want to apply through the school for a new club since in many schools you're entitled to funding through the "student activities" fee or its equivalent. You need the money to pay for free food, which is what will attract people to come.

I think that today using a Facebook group or Twitter or both might make the most sense.

Running for the president of your school's ACM chapter may also help, and in some schools you can also go for a Sun or MS campus ambassador and get funding and materials.