Students organize bar crawl for graduating seniors

An estimated 150 Augustana seniors will take on local bars and breweries around Sioux Falls in the inaugural Augie Senior Bar Crawl on May 4. 

The bar crawl will take attendees around local bars and breweries in Sioux Falls. While the event is not affiliated with Augustana, two Augustana seniors, Kari McKay and Lauren Hanson, organized it.

The organizers said they drew inspiration from friends at the University of Minnesota and the University of Wisconsin-Madison who participated in similar events.

“Why not Augie?” McKay and Hanson wrote in an email to the Mirror.

According to organizers, the event will start at Fernson’s Brewing Co. before moving to Blarney Stone Pub, Bin201, Lucky’s, PAve and Wileys Bar. The night will finish at Crow Bar. 

The organizers lined up exclusive deals with local businesses for participants, such as free Jell-O shots at the Blarney Stone Pub and half-off pints at Fernson Brewing Co.

“The event organizers were great to work with. Kari and Lauren were very good at reaching out and contacting me,” Nick Wanner, the general manager at the Blarney Stone Pub, said. “They were polite and appreciative of our partnership. We were very happy to work with such great people.”

In order to take advantage of these deals, however, seniors must purchase an Augustana Senior Bar Crawl t-shirt. Although the window to order t-shirts closed on April 12, students wishing to participate can still attend.

“When communicating with local businesses, we decided that a group t-shirt would be the best way to identify group participants who were eligible for the deals they were offering us,” McKay and Hanson‌ wrote. “When students purchased their shirts, the money was solely the price of the shirt. No money came back to us or to Augustana.”

In order to spread the word about the bar crawl, the organizers relied on Instagram, word of mouth and a few mass emails. 

The first mass email was sent to the email addresses of 494 students listed as seniors on BuzzBook; however, BuzzBook determines who is a senior based off of credit hours, not when students actually plan to graduate, which led to confusion among non-seniors who received the email.

Bailey Wolfgang received the mass email advertising the event, but they are a junior.

“I was a little confused about it until I realized I'm classified as a senior by credits, especially because I'm not 21 and I've only been here for three years,” Wolfgang said.

Senior Samantha Skarsgard first learned about the event through the Instagram page, @augiebarcrawl. 

“I think it's a great idea to get the seniors together to celebrate all the hard work that they have put in the past four years as well as to let the seniors have a final event with their friends that they can look forward to,” Skarsgard said.

Senior Jordan Hagel said she is unsure whether or not she will attend the event.

“I’m still undecided because the actual details, besides the date, are very limited,” Hagel said. “If there is alcohol involved, I like to either just be with people I trust or know as much as I can.”

Although the event is centered around visiting different bars and breweries, the organizers said the event is for all graduating seniors — not just those who choose to drink.

“Of course, it is a bar crawl, but drinking is not required by any means,” McKay and Hanson said. “We hope people can come no matter what their personal choices towards drinking may be and enjoy being with classmates.”

Additionally, the organizers said they hope participants can employ safe drinking practices if they choose to drink. 

“We hope people can be responsible as they participate,” McKay and Hanson said. “Safety is always a concern and something we have had in the back of our minds while planning… If planning to drink at the bar crawl, participants should organize a sober ride, whether that be through Uber, Lyft or friends.” 

In total, the organizers plan on having around 150 seniors participating in the crawl.

“We hope that attendees will be able to enjoy a night of celebration with the people they have gotten to know over the past four years,” McKay and Hanson said. “It will be one of the last times we are all together before graduation, so we want to celebrate graduation, each other and the town that we have called home for the duration of our college years.”

The organizers plan to pass down the Instagram and email address to incoming seniors in hopes that they will continue this event for years to come.