SMC highlights the Halloween season at Club Row
There were fewer tricks and more treats at Santa Monica College’s (SMC) Fall semester Club Row on Thursday, Oct. 30. Organized by the Inter Club Council, clubs from across campus embraced the Halloween spirit, dressing up in themed costumes, decorating booths with cobwebs and pumpkins, and handing out candy to students throughout the main quad.
The day before Halloween, many students dressed in costume, and Club Row gave people the chance to explore the various clubs in a fun and festive way, allowing clubs and their members to show off their spirit and creativity.
The Adelante Club put on a spooky carnival featuring a popcorn stand next to a giant tent entrance resembling a clown’s face. Inside, members in clown costumes and makeup greeted potential new club members with a prizewheel and candy.
“Our president is dressed as Art the clown from ‘Terrifier,’ so we decided to go for a circus theme,” said Jake Aleman-Perez, vice president of the Adelante Club.
Earlier in the week, Adelante members gathered to prepare for the event with a decorating party. The club’s social media director sketched out the design for the giant clown head ahead of time, and club members jumped in to help with painting and creating other props for the tent. “It was a good experience for them to interact with us and join in on the process of making our whole Club Row possible,” Aleman-Perez said.
The Women in Business Club went all out with their set-up, mixing humor and horror for their booth. Their tent included a life-sized picture of Kris Jenner and a hanging body bag that drew double takes from people walking by.
Additionally, the club hosted a screaming contest where co-presidents Emmelia Goh and Vivian Le, along with vice president Nicky Wong, judged students based on how loud and terrifying their screams were.
Smaller prizes were handed out to people who participated, while students with the loudest screams took home king-size candy bars.
“We wanted everyone to just get into the spirit with some scariness,” Wong said. Le added, “Yeah, because Halloween’s not scary anymore, so we really need to scare some people.”
The Korean Student Association brought their own cultural twist to Club Row, dressing as characters from the Korean show “Squid Game” and playing ddakji — a traditional Korean game seen in the show where players try to flip their opponent’s folded paper tile by slamming their own down onto it.
Associated Students (AS) joined in on the day’s festivities by offering rubber duckies, stress balls and custom-made Halloween bracelets to students who showed up in costume. The club also had a temporary spray-on tattoo machine that brought in a small line throughout the event.
Nahomy Rivas, AS director of activities, said she came up with the idea for the booth with the support of the whole AS body. While handing out donut holes to students who followed the AS Instagram and liked a post, Rivas said, “We’re trying to boost our engagement as AS because a lot of our students are not aware of what’s happening on campus or about AS in general, and we need more of that awareness.”
A DJ played out on the lawn, spinning tracks as students roamed the quad, going from booth to booth exploring different clubs and what each one had to offer. As the event came to a close, the Melanated Roots Choir put on an acapella performance of “Back on 74” by Jungle and “Golden” from “KPop Demon Hunters.”
This semester’s Club Row highlighted the creativity and collaboration of SMC’s student clubs, shining a light on SMC’s campus spirit and connecting students through candy, costumes and community building.
For a full list of clubs, visit SMC’s club page.