Second annual Fall Gala successful despite weather

The second annual Fall Gala on Sept. 6 was a considerable success, according to Office for Campus Life (OCL) Assistant Director David McGraw. Despite the event's relocation from the Academic Quad to the Gantcher Center, McGraw said that both students and the administration were satisfied with the experience.

“Students were impressed with the transformation of Gantcher, and administration [was] happy that we were able to keep the positive feeling of this event,” McGraw told the Daily in an email.

Members of the Junior Class Council Jason Brillon and Julia Turock noted that the success of this year’s event was built off the success of last year’s inaugural Fall Gala, which replaced Fall Ball. Brillon, a junior, explained that the Programming Board planned a more extended “Welcome Weekend" for this year.

“For us, it was taking Fall Gala and creating a larger weekend-long programming out of it,” Brillon said. “Our first decision was to separate the fireworks from Fall Gala, so the gala could go later into the evening and also so that we would have multiple days of things going on.”

In addition to the fireworks and the gala, Brillon noted that Welcome Weekend events included a free ice cream truck, a hypnotist, free air-brush tattoos, a breakfast social and a series of college-themed movies.

Turock, also a junior, admitted that there were worries that Fall Gala would become indistinguishable from Fall Ball because of its move to Gantcher, but every effort was made to recreate last year’s event.

“We had the same band, same decor, same catering, everything was the same, just in a different location, and I personally believe it was much more like last year’s Fall Gala than previous years’ Fall Ball,” Turock  said.

McGraw agreed, emphasizing that Fall Gala is meant to usher in the new school year in a positive and fun social atmosphere. He added that Fall Ball had consistently failed to do this.

“Fall Ball ... was just a big dance in a dark, hot room,” McGraw said.

Emily Ehrmann, Programming Board chair, explained that the gala’s live music was one of the major improvements over Fall Ball, which featured a DJ.

“I think having live music really changes the atmosphere, because you feel that you’re at an event at which there’s more human interaction and involvement; it’s not like you walked into a cookie cutter club anywhere ... there is a sort of intimacy when you have a live band,” Ehrmann, a senior, said.

Dean of Student Affairs Mary Pat McMahon explained that the OCL was able to increase the number of available tickets from last year’s figure of 2,000.

Attendance at Fall Gala was consistent with last year’s event, according to Brillon and Turock. All 2,250 tickets were sold out, and Brillon estimated that around 2,000 people showed up to the event this year.

According to Brillon, many students expressed their satisfaction with Fall Gala's food, while the only major negative remarks concerned the heat in Gantcher. According to McMahon, however, the heat was significantly ameliorated by the storm that evening.

Regarding issues of student intoxication, McMahon said that the event was relatively incident free, with only one student transported from Gantcher due to alcohol.

Sgt. Robert McCarthy of the Tufts University Police Department agreed that the event went extremely smoothly.

“Considering it had to be moved [into Gantcher], I thought it went very well,” he said. “We only transported one [student] to the hospital ... On our end we had no problems, it really went [smoothly], and hopefully next year it’ll be back outside.”

Brillon added that next year's event will not need to change, as it was an organizational success.

“I hope [Fall Gala] becomes something people really look forward to coming back, and if that happens, I can see this becoming one of the year’s most talked about, looked-forward-to events, even in the summer,” Ehrmann said.