Comedy as a Campus Identity

My time at Drexel has been defined by myriad experiences for which I am forever grateful. That being said, there is wholly one opportunity that has consistently proven to be the most rewarding in my mind. My first year I auditioned, and made it on to, what is perhaps one of the strangest organizations here at Drexel, The Drexel Football Team.

Now at any other school your football team is a tradition; it is a way of life for a university, it is their champions. The Drexel Football Team, however, is a ragtag group of students who, like their namesake, revel in the mirth of bemusement. The Drexel Football Comedy Improv Team, its full name, is a small, 6- to 10-person group of individual comedians who have come together over the last 10 years to perform, discuss, and experience comedy. We perform shows with crowds of over 200 people with themes as crazy as they come. We talk, analyze, and invent comedy. We are teammates, and fans, and friends. We are the DFT.

There is a level of belonging when you find a group that is your group.

I'm a huge believer in campus identity. In other words, "What do you do that makes you unique from the other 12,999 students who go here?" I am in a lot of student organizations: The Campus Activity Board, Student Ambassadors, Philosophy Club, American Marketing Association, Space Allocation Committee — and they are all wonderful. Yet, for me, above all else, I am a member of the Drexel Football Team.

The team gave me a group of like-minded people who enjoy exploring a passion I've always valued highly. It gave me a space to develop as a member of campus. There is a level of belonging when you find a group that is your group. That feeling radiates outside you and makes you feel closer to the entire Drexel community. It is my campus identity.

Dominick Arp is a Drexel student.