Board games may not be everyone’s idea of stress relief, but it did the trick for students who came together in the AC Hub to attend Wind Down Fridays.
The event is free for students and provides a way to relax and meet new people after a week of learning.
Algonquin Student Support Services hosted a board game edition of its event series on Friday, Sept. 18. Students started arriving at 1 p.m. to find a cache of chips and soda along with a stack of board games waiting.
Players had their choice of Settlers of Catan, Scrabble, Jenga, Munchkin and chess. After checking the room for similar interests, students grouped up and started playing.
Attendees were supportive of the idea of taking space on campus in order to have events like Wind Down Fridays. Board games seem to be having a resurgence with game-centric establishments such as Monopolatte and the Game Loft recently becoming popular destinations in Ottawa for those interested in the lifestyle.
Second year Business-marketing student Torbin Lester said that using space for niche interests in the AC Hub was a good idea.
“The school only has something like 1,200 open seats at any time and they fill up insanely fast,” he said. Lester was sitting at a table with two other students playing Settlers of Catan, the three had never met, but were getting to know each other as they played.
The effort Algonquin Student Support Services has put into appealing to different interests might bear fruit. Creative writing alumni Nicholas Tsoukalis, sitting across from Lester, didn’t find it hard to get a game of Settlers going.
“It’s very easy for you to sit down and play with strangers because, after all, a stranger is a friend you haven’t met,” he said, “Barney told us that.”