From volunteering to setting up student events, Freshman Forum is starting 2014 off with a bang. Their goal of 1,830 service hours to commemorate the founding of the university in 1830 is looking closer that ever, coming in at a total of 1,614 hours. This leaves them with 216 hours left to complete.

“We have events that are still being planned, but we hope to do three or four service events,” said Service Committee Chairwoman Erica Blackstock. “There is not a planned date for these events, but we want to do at least one event each month.”

The forum is already in the process of planning two events for the spring semester — a community-wide barbecue and a campus paint party.

The forum discussed the planning of a barbecue party to attract members of both the UNA and Florence community to bring them together through a social gathering.

“There are a lot of permits we have to get involving food and safety,” said Finance Committee member Dylan McKelvey. “For instance, the location of the festival and whether we can have it in a public or private domain.”

McKelvey is currently speaking with the finance committee to prepare to set up with the Alabama Department of Public Health, he said.

“We have to be certified, to an extent, with regulation and food safety,” he said. “So far nothing is set in stone, although a tentative date is preferably set for the third week in April.”

A paint party is being planned to help fund money for various charities on campus, said social committee member Parrish Tuggles.

“The paint party is going to be Freshman Forum’s way of doing Rave to Raise,” he said.

The paint party is Freshman Forum’s way of adding something new to old traditions previously held on campus and will replace the annual Rave to Raise event, Tuggles said.

The forum is currently looking into other details for the paint party, such as the location and date.

“We want to do the paint party in the warmer months so sometime in April,” Tuggles said.

“We’re currently looking at a couple of locations, but right now we’re still in the planning process.

The forum is also looking at presenting a couple of videos to students to promote SGA and the projects they have planned throughout the year via social media, said student issues committee member Dominic Summerhill.

Summerhill said he will be meeting with Department of Communications Chair Gregory Pitts to finalize the video.

“We’re actually working on two (video) projects,” he said. “One will be Mollie Schaefer’s recycling project from last semester, and the other one will be a recruit-ment video that has been discussed with our vice president, Jackson Townsend.”

These videos will be posted to the Student Government Association’s Facebook, Instagram and Twitter accounts. The recruitment video will be used to promote stu-dent involvement in SGA activities that are being planned later on this year.

“Seems like they’ll both be great events. I will attend the barbecue, but not the paint party,” said Yasmin Carthen, a sophomore.

Carthen felt that the paint party while fun, would be a little messy, she said.

“I don’t want to get my clothes dirty,” said Carthen. “It does seem fun, but it might get out of hand with the paint being all over everyone,” she said.

Carthen also believed that the events should both be held in a private setting, she said.

“Definitely private, because we pay for it as a school,” said Carthen.

Students may also look at these events as Freshman Forum’s way of showing that they’re trying to be engaged with students.

“I think that it would really benefit the community,” said student Benjamin Brown, also a sophomore. “The paint party would be cool to because a lot of people are getting into that.”