Manno mans student activities

Home News Manno mans student activities

Anthony Manno `13 is the new Director of Student Activities and the Grewcock Student Union and he said he has exciting things in store for this year.

“I want students to really have a full college experience.” Manno said. “Here at Hillsdale we’re so academically focused, which is fantastic, however in order to have a complete college experience, a lot of that is social, and if we’re not getting that, then I’m not doing my job right.”

Originally from Dearborn, Michigan, Manno came to Hillsdale to play basketball. After five years as a student, Manno graduated with majors in financial management and Spanish. Though he had planned on moving to Spain after graduation, the student activities director position opened up and shifted Manno’s future.

“I was going to move to Spain and go to a Christian leadership academy over there, but God opens other doors it would be very foolish and unwise to not walk through some of them,” Manno said.

Manno walked into a position focused on improving the lives of all Hillsdale students.

“If we’re not making exciting enough events with Student Activities Board or interesting enough events with Campus Recreation or not offering good enough volunteer programs, then I’m failing somewhere,” Manno said.

Both SAB and the Campus Recreation Board are working to embrace Manno’s ideas of balanced work and play. Hillsdale senior and director of SAB Mallory Sachen worked with Manno over the summer to organize the Welcome Party, so students could begin the new academic year with something other than studies and syllabi.

“I think the Welcome Party was fantastic.  It’s funny because over the summer a lot of the SAB team wasn’t here [in Hillsdale] so there was really a lot of planning over the phone,” Sachen said. “So when we got to see it all come together so smoothly; it was great. We had a blast.”

Manno, who spent most of the summer overseeing SAB planning and trying to figure out the mechanics of his new position, was also satisfied with the way his work had paid off.

“I like to cook a lot, so I equate planning events a lot to cooking: if you make a meal from scratch, by the time you eat it, you’re going to appreciate what you just made,” Manno said. “For Welcome Party, I started doing some planning for that back in June and by the time it got to the end of August and we had come together as a team and all worked together and finally put it on, and saw all the labor take shape, I appreciated the event that much more.”

Sophomore Paul Mittermeier, who attended the Welcome Party both this year and last year said he enjoyed the music.

“The music was the best part for me; I really did enjoy it in comparison to last year.  I also thought the addition of the inflatable pin was better than last year’s inflatable slide,” Mittermeier said.

Manno said SAB and the Campus Recreation Board are focused on making this school year more enjoyable for all students.