WSU’s Division of Student Affairs will host an event from 1-4 p.m. Friday at the Elson S. Floyd Cultural Center.

The event is both the reopening of the cultural center and a way for students to make new connections with peers and organizations that advocate for diversity, said Jason Abrams, principal assistant for student engagement and community, equity and inclusive excellence. 

“Folks might have some rusty social skills or may be coming to campus for the first time,” he said. “The work that we do in student affairs is all about supporting students and their experience outside of the classroom. We thought there may be the need to reintroduce some of the things we do to students who may not know they exist.” 

The event will offer free food from three different food trucks while supplies last, Abrams said. Inside the cultural center, there will be tables from different groups such as the African American Student Center and Gender Identity/Expression and Sexual Orientation Resource Center. 

Students will get to interact with different members from each of the organizations and form connections with those on-campus groups, said Undocumented Initiatives Director Marcela Pattinson. 

Pattinson said while the event serves as a way for students to meet each other, they want to emphasize the resource centers and all they have to offer. 

Aside from the tabling in the main room, students will also have the opportunity to participate in three different activities designed to help them build connections over common interests, Abrams said. 

The first room will have canvas painting run by Wild at Art, a Moscow-based studio, Abrams said.

The second room will allow students to build their own terrariums and is designed to engage students interested in house plants. This room will be run by A Modern Plantsman, a Colfax-based plant shop, he said. 

The last room will be run by Palouse Paws and will give students the opportunity to see some of the organization’s rescue dogs, Abrams said. 

Pattinson said besides the tabling and activities offered, the event is also a way to reopen the cultural center to the public and to allow students to appreciate the building. 

“It’s just an opportunity to open that space that’s beautiful,” she said. “Students will have a way to see it and feel it.”

No registration is required for the event, and everything is first-come, first-served, Abrams said.