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College and university traditions live on

College and university traditions are often spectacles with epic reputations. One small event turns into a trans-generational inherited party.

U of C has Bermuda Shorts Day (BSD) as a last kick-at-the-party-cat every year. Now, SAITSA wants to build a reputation around its upcoming, second annual Last Class Bash.

Last year The Dudes played the event with Chixdiggit. The Dudes are back again this year to take SAIT students out with a bang, or rather a bash.

Dan Vacon, lead singer of The Dudes, says the energy runs high during these events. “It was honestly a crazy vibe. We totally can feed off that. The high fives are a little bit higher and everyone parties a notch harder,” he said.

The Dudes got their start at another Calgary tradition, the Rock Central Stampede breakfast. Rock Central was a seedy old house on the east end of Calgary’s downtown core and its punk rock pancake breakfast was legendary.

It went on for ten years until the house was torn down. It was an epic tradition that lives on in the hearts of The Dudes. “I dream about that house at least once a week and it’s a weird part of my mentalscape,” Vacon said.

Marc Thususka, SAITSA events and programming manager says beginning a tradition like BSD or the Rock Central breakfast requires building student excitement.

“(SAIT) is a Calgary commuter school,” Thususka said. “It’s a bit different than U of C, but it’s no more different to starting those trends.”

BSD has been a tradition since the late ’60s and is radically different from SAITSA’s Last Class Bash.

While the Gateway event celebrates with music and booze, BSD is a themed event that can get a bit more wild.

Kat Lord, U of C VP of Events says students look forward to this tradition every year. “Because BSD is such a large event, we make sure the students stay safe. EMS is on site, police come out, campus security,” she said.

Traditions in the form of such raucous parties often require an outside element for crowd control. “Rock Central started out as a kind of a rebel thing that the police hated,” said Vacon.

U of C traditions then and now

A naked woman on a white horse would ride majestically through the U of C halls as a salute to the last day of class. It was called the Lady Godiva ride. Now that we are in more “politically correct” times, there is no longer an effort to preserve this particular tradition, said Lord.

Another tradition on the U of C campus: The Rock, a boulder that’s painted every three to seven days. Students use it to express opinions. No one really knows when this tradition cropped up, says Lord. It’s simply been a fixture of campus life for some time.

SAIT also had a similar rock on campus, but it’s been removed in the last few years.

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