Checking in with The Fleet’s founders to see what is working
Will Hoogendyk IV, Campus Carrier sports editor
Last September, two Berry students turned an idea into reality. For Daphne Tremps and Kate Dempsey, this meant gathering fellow classmates to form The Fleet: an interest group that seeks to raise school spirit and student engagement at Berry athletic games. With their sights set on becoming an official club soon, both students have been working long hours to spread their passion for Berry sports to everyone they know.
An interest group must exist for 10 months and prove membership, interest and attendance before they can be approved to become a fully sponsored club. While the Fleet is still in the interest group stage, both Tremps and Dempsey have learned a lot in the months since they started serving with the group.
While Berry athletics are generally quite successful, getting students to attend games has proven to be more difficult than Tremps had hoped.
“We thought if we create space for this, it’ll happen,” Tremps said. “That was not the case. You really have to put in a ton of promotional work with a ton of different organizations and parent groups. It’s really difficult being a club with no funding because you have a trial period.”
Since their first appearance when Berry’s football team played DePauw University on Sept. 14, the Fleet has largely stuck to organizing at Pack the House events which happen a couple times a month. While these events encourage Berry students to attend sporting events of all types and encourage their fellow Vikings, the Fleet aims to bring the same level of support at all Berry athletic contests.
The Fleet’s passion for the athletes and teams that represent Berry is shared by more than just them, as they have started to collaborate with other like-minded student organizations on social media.
“It’s really been interesting that this year we started and then there’s been the @dayatberry Instagram and then also @burn._the._boats,” Dempsey said. “The three of us have collaborated with posting things [and] the two people that run those accounts have helped us a lot in promoting games. It’s been cool, social media-wise, to work with them.”
Behind the scenes of the planning and organizing for a sporting event, Tremps and Dempsey talked about how much work goes into pre-event planning.
“Marking off student sections is a big thing that we’ve realized is the downfall with athletics,” Tremps said. “It’s hard to get excited as a student body when we’re all intermingled with parents, so that’s something that we’re figuring out how to make more apparent to students. We need to make a banner in the Cage or at Valhalla that indicates that, and as we keep showing up, hopefully people start to pick up on things.”
While gathering the students in one place has been more difficult than Tremps and Dempsey have hoped for, their resolve remains strong in their desire for the club’s future.
“The goal remains that we can set traditions within athletics at Berry,” Dempsey said. “[Whether] that’s a fight song or just things that we do at the games that students get excited for athletics. I think we want to try and get more people involved on the planning part of the Fleet team so that it can be something that is passed on throughout the years.”
Tremps and Dempsey, who are both planning on staying at Berry this summer to work, are already making plans for the Fleet next year.
“I think one of my little summer projects will be to get better in touch with the parent organizations for each team,” Tremps said. “The football team has massive parent tailgating before the games. Basketball and volleyball parents are handing out all this gear. I’ve got some contacts there that we need to pursue a little bit more and explain to them what we’re hoping to do. I’m sure they’d be eager to help because they always seem to want us to do things, but if we could touch base, we could actually organize ourselves a little bit.”
Because athletic events are scheduled so far in advance, Berry’s Pack the House calendar is typically established in the summer. Tremps and Dempsey hope to be involved in the planning process of these events and to start preparations for what they will entail for students who attend.
“We have talked about merch,” Tremps said. “I love the idea of stickers or t-shirts. That’s another thing to talk to parents about helping with funding. We could get a club email that we can send out emails to students.”
Despite the challenges that the Fleet has faced this year, there has been steady growth both in the interest and reach of the group. Social media has continued to be the best way to reach students and Tremps plans to continue increasing their online presence. The Fleet will continue to show up at each and every sporting event encouraging both spirit and pride for Berry College athletics.