By Zach Mosca
Jambar Contributor
Every college student has a challenge of some sort, but not very many can say that they have had to compete in a challenge until only one student is left standing in the end. The few students who can say they have are part of the YSUrvivor club.
The YSUrvivor club was created in 2015 and has been going strong ever since with new students eager to compete each semester for the chance to be the sole survivor.
Sarah Davis, president of the club, said it is based on the hit CBS reality show “Survivor,” in which contestants are divided up into three “tribes” and compete in various games each week. The games continue until one contestant is left standing, who claims the title of the sole survivor.
“We do different challenges every week, like some kind of puzzle or other kind of game that we do somewhere on campus. Whichever team wins has immunity, and whichever team loses has to vote someone out,” Davis said.
Students are in for a new experience each week, with each challenge differing from the last. Davis said last week’s challenge was an endurance test where students stood on one leg and whoever held out the longest would win, while this week’s challenge is a memory game.
“I’m going to flash symbols on a screen, and everyone’s going to get a chance to look at it and as soon as they feel like they’ve memorized the pattern. They’re going to tell me to stop and I’ll take the pattern away and everyone has to remake the pattern,” Davis said.
Kaleigh Dargiewicz, a senior electrical engineering major, joined the club in the spring 2015 semester thanks to a friend prompting her to join and she hasn’t looked back since.
“One of my friends was already in it and invited me to join it, and then I made a lot more friends after I joined it and I just kept playing,” Dargiewicz said.
She also said that she’s constantly making new friends in the club and she’s become very close with some of them.
“There’s always new people joining, so it’s always a lot of fun to meet new people and make new friends, and I still hang out with a lot of the friends I’ve made in the ‘Survivor’ club,” Dargiewicz said.
Each semester in the survivor club is a whole new experience with brand new challenges, which keeps students like Dargiewicz coming back for repeated attempts at winning the title of the sole survivor.
“The actual TV show will have different challenges with each season, and Sarah will base her challenges off of that. So it’s kind of interesting and it’s always new,” Dargiewicz said.
In order to come out on top, students must think outside the box each week, stay on their toes and prepare to expect the unexpected because teams can and will attempt to interfere with the strategies of their opponents.
“The new strategies you have to come up with every week and the different things people will do to thwart your strategies are really interesting,” Dargiewicz said.
While the club can get extremely competitive, it also allows students who join it to branch out and meet new friends. With new people joining every semester, even longtime veterans of the club can make brand new friends every time they play.
