The concept of Late Night Dana was conceived by Colby Lauria ’25 while eating in Dana like many other SLU students. “I sit up there,” said Lauria pointing at the tables for two above the pit. Looking down at the pit Lauria said, “wait, that’s pretty much like a mosh pit.”
From Lauria’s initial spark of inspiration Late Night Dana has been over nine months in the making. “Colby and the Music Appreciation Club originally brought this idea to Student Activities last February,” said Christopher Marquart M’09 the associate dean of student life & community engagement. Having previously done the 24 hours in Dana challenge helped build trust with the administration, which was key according to Lauria.
“That was the first time they have ever let someone, like a student, inside the building unsupervised,” according to Lauria. “They just gave me a meeting, you know, they gave me a chance to explain it.” Planning the event took a combined effort by Dining Services, Student Life, Association for Campus Entertainement, Safety and Security and Lauria to bring this event together.
Ensuring Dana can serve food in the morning was essential throughout the planning process. “It’s going to be basically a crew of like 10 people to clean the spot, which should take about an hour and a half,” said Lauria. The crew will be comprised of students who will receive a $50 stipend to clean after the event and provide additional support throughout. All cleaning supplies will be provided by dining services.
Ensuring the safety of students and proper conduct in Dana was a must. “There’ll be four security officers,” said Lauria. The presence of security officers will help to maintain a safe and responsible environment according to Marquart unlike campus-wide events like Titus Weekend. “During Titus, we have not had security staffed inside of the dining hall, they would pass through during rounds or come if we called them for assistance,” said Marquart. Lauria emphasized that smoking would not be allowed. “That’s a very big thing about this,” said Lauria. “If the fire alarms are set off at all, it’s done.
To truly make the night special Lauria hired a sound technician, rented speakers, got Artie Koprulu ’25 and Sammy Carp ’27 who are student DJ’s to each play a set and is enforcing a dress code. Along with the high quality of the event Colby took a new approach to advertising. “I feel like it wouldn’t be doing it justice putting it all on one flyer,” stated Lauria on the decision to make booklets.
Quinn Sirgany ’27 who will be attending the event, said Lauria’s advertising strategy worked. “For me I was really intrigued by the booklets,” she said.
Despite the extra expense to create a high quality event it pales in cost to similar campus events. Harvest Fest which was put on last weekend cost over $25,000 according to a document leaked by a member of ACE. In contrast, Late Night Dana is being put on with a budget of approximately $4,000. Despite the high cost Lauria reported he only saw around 60 students at Harvest Fest at once. Contrastingly tickets to Late Night Dana sold out in two minutes according to Lauria.
“It was a hot commodity it was like Taylor Swift tickets you had to get your hands on them fast,” said Carter Daniels ’27. Charlotte Blake ’27 couldn’t get a ticket and said, “I feel like I’m missing out on a revolutionary event.” The guest limit is a necessity according to Marquart who said, “the guest limit was put in place for safety reasons and there are fire code requirements that limit occupancy inside Dana.” One way Lauria hopes to get more people through the door is the waitlist. “If people have a ticket and they don’t show up on time, people who didn’t get a ticket and are on the waitlist might be able to come through.”
Ultimately, Lauria hopes students can give credit to the administration for helping make Late Night Dana happen. “It’s cool to kind of see them do something like this,” expressed Lauria. “They have our best interests at heart, you know?”