WT Core is bringing students a new way to keep their lives on track and in order. Partnering with Montreal-based company OOHLALA, students can now download the eponymous OOHLALA Campus App for IOS and Android. The app brings a number of tools and features to the table, all intended to help students get active and involved while keeping their schedule straight. Touting students from over 1000 campuses and claiming to be “the most useful app on campus,” OOHLALA promises to keep college students connected to their friends, classes, and clubs.
Many of the central features of the Campus App are centered on interacting with others. Students using the app that are nearby can start chatting and the campus wall page acts as a central forum for all students at a university to post and chat with each other. Friends within the app can see each other’s schedules and whether or not someone is busy. Friends can also leave messages for one another.
The app also offers connection between students and organizations on campus. Groups can create a profile, individual profiles for officers, and create events for their members. Any group on campus can get on the app by contacting the Core office and providing contact information.
“We’re going to try to get all the campus student activities on there,” said Caleb Hubbard, a junior math major with the Core office, “we want everything that could possibly go on there for students in there.”
WT Core was approached by OOHLALA to use the app on campus.
“We did a lot of research into it and looked at what the qualities of it were and took it and had it approved by the vice president of student affairs,” said Amanda Kraemer, a graduate student also with the Core office, “we needed a way to get information out to students that’s more student friendly. It’s designed by students for students.”
“It’s easy to set up events and information for other people to see, it is very handy and it certainly has a lot of potential,” said Chelsa Ball, president of the WT Secular Student Alliance, whose organization is signed on with the app commented on the app.
On Sept. 9 students met at the Buffalo fountain to test out one of the apps features, a virtual treasure hunt game utilizing the app’s map of campus. The object of the game was to use the app to locate a virtual treasure chest somewhere on campus and then evade other students using the app to try and steal away the chest. While there, freshman environmental engineering major Ashley Riley and freshman music therapy and education major Betheny Thompson shared their opinions on OOHLALA’s app.
“It’s a good idea, not everyone gets involved and it lets people understand what’s happening,” said Riley, “this will give me clarification when things are happening.”
“It’s very well organized, it looks really cool and it’s really easy to go through and find people,” said Thompson.
