With Homecoming week just around the corner, UCF students are becoming eager, and they are ready to watch their Knights take on the Houston Cougars! But Homecoming week at UCF isn’t simply about the football game.
Homecoming week is very exciting for all campus organizations, as there are many opportunities for each organization to take part in. Every night during homecoming week, there are various events that UCF students can all attend for free: Spirit Splash, Movie Knight, Comedy Knight, and one of the greatest and most anticipated parts of Homecoming week – Concert Knight!
Each year, UCF students eagerly anticipate the Homecoming Concert, as it always turns out to be bigger and better than the year before. But have you ever wondered who chooses the spectacular artist that will perform at this big event, and better yet, how do they choose?
Sydney Altfield, a junior at UCF studying Event Management, is the one behind the scenes. Not only does she choose who performs at Concert Knight, she basically gets to plan the entire concert! In doing this, she also gets to MEET the performers, which is totally worth all of her hard work, if you ask me!
I got to sit down with Sydney one-on-one this week, and she was more than excited to share a few details about her position.
When & how did you become homecoming concert director?
Applications for the Homecoming Executive Board came out last year in March, and right away I knew that I wanted to serve as the Homecoming Concert Director as my second position (my first was Philanthropy Director last year) on the 2013 UCF Homecoming Executive Board. I went through the process of applications as well as interviews and somehow the stars were aligned in the right way and I ended up with the responsibility of planning the BIGGEST concert UCF has and will ever see.
How do you choose who will perform for homecoming?
Choosing artists to please 60,000+ students is probably the hardest and most stressful part of this position. I’m the kind of person who wants to please everyone, but I had to suck it up and realize it would never in a million years happen. After analyzing our surveys from previous years, hard deliberations with our agent, checking availabilities of artists, we had MANY choices but Benny Benassi, Timeflies, and DJ Crespo just fit so perfectly with everything. (And I must admit I wanted the bragging rights of Timeflies performing their FIRST Florida show at the BEST University in the country!)
Is your job difficult or easy? Why or why not? Do you have fun while working?
Well, what many students don’t realize is how much work goes into this position. Even before I got the position, I thought the Concert Director just chose who they wanted, then it may or may not happen and then concert fairies just wave their wand and poof there is the concert. But then I realized that is completely false. I plan everything from who is coming, sound check times, to the way the stage will look all the way to what color lights will be flashing when the beat drops. It can get stressful at times because not everything goes my way, but I am so lucky to have a really positive outlook on things. If something goes wrong, I always find a way to turn it into a positive. I think that’s a great lesson even just for your everyday life. And is it FUN? DUHH, IT’S FUN! I get to meet one the best DJ of our times as well as the CUTIES of Timeflies. I also get to say I planned a concert for 8,000+ people at the age of 21. WHO ELSE GETS TO SAY THAT?? I wouldn’t change this experience for the life of me.
What is your favorite part about being concert director?
There are so many AMAZING parts of being Concert Director that I can’t just pinpoint one. One would definitely be all of the experience I am getting at such a young age. I can truly vouch that UCF really does stand for opportunity. Another favorite part is working with an incredible board. If I didn’t have the backing of the Homecoming Board, Advisors and Graduate Assistants, none of what I do would be possible. I am so lucky to have them every step of the way and I wouldn’t want it any way else.Â
What are you most excited about for this year’s homecoming?
This year’s Homecoming is going to be the BIGGEST and BEST Homecoming this school has ever seen. We are making Homecoming a movement, not just a week of events. When the movement comes you’ll know it’s here.
What have been some of the best homecoming concerts at UCF in past years?
Last year with Snoop Dogg was pretty epic. We’ve had LMFAO, Lupe Fiasco, Luke Bryan, and many other big names. But if you ask me this is going to be the biggest and the best. And we have so much in store for the night that students have no idea what’s coming. Â
What have you learned from your experience?
From this experience I have learned that learning out side of the classroom is the best learning you could do in college. Yes the textbooks have great vocab words but the textbooks don’t challenge you to make mistakes and learn from them.
What other organizations are you involved in at UCF?
Being involved on campus is the most important thing that anyone at UCF could do. I’ve been involved with so many different organizations throughout my time here at UCF, but these are some of the ones that I am involved in currently: I am the Vice President of Sisterhood of Alpha Epsilon Phi Sorority, I sit on the SDES Student Advisory Board, I am the Event Coordinator of UCF Panhellenic’s Pack to Attack Hunger, and I am EXTREMELY involved with Knight-Thon, UCF’s official student run philanthropy (FTKWA!). UCF stands for opportunity but that doesn’t meant that these “so-called” opportunities are going to be knocking at your door. You have to wake up and be proactive. A very good friend of mine, the Homecoming Student Director, Jarrod Fucci always says, “If you’re sleeping more than eight hours a night, then you’re doing it wrong” and I couldn’t agree more.
What are your plans after graduation?
I don’t even know what I am going to do in the next 5 minutes, let alone after graduation! HAHA! But what I do know is that I want to make a difference with whatever occupation my life takes me to.
Advice for incoming freshmen at UCF?
The best advice I could give freshman is to GET INVOLVED!! It’s so easy to get lost in the crowd of 60,000+ students but UCF has the close-knit community feel that you can feel at a school with 5,000 students. The UCF community is so unique but you have to remember that what you put into it is what you will get out. And always remember STAY POSITIVE! This is the best 4 or for some of you 5 years of your life. LIVE IT UP! Make mistakes and learn from them. I may have all this responsibility on my shoulders but I am still a student just like all of you. I make mistakes, I bomb pop quizzes, but I don’t let it get me down. I know that in the long run, UCF will have shaped me to be the person I am not because of the bad grade I got on my paper freshman year but because of the difference I made on campus.
Â
Although she has had to work extremely hard, and has probably had many sleepless nights, Sydney clearly has made a difference at UCF! She seems very happy with the organizational choices that she has made during her time here at UCF, and she obviously loves her position as Concert Director.
So if you ever happen to see this celeb on campus, be sure to stop her and thank her (if she’s not running past you, trying to get to her next organization’s meeting) for all of her hard work and dedication to make sure that we have the best Homecoming ever!