By Tressa Versteeg

The Mac Weekly followed the sounds of hooting and hollering to Kilt Krew. We sat down with President Eric Engstrom ’11 to find out what they’ve got going on.The Mac Weekly: How long has Kilt Krew been around?
Eric Engstrom: This is the second year that Kilt Krew has been an organization on campus.

TMW: Who started it? Why?
EE: Kilt Krew was started by one of most dedicated members, Nash Traylor ’10. He started this organization to try and bring people on campus together to support student activities. A lot of people go through hard work to put together some of the events around Macalester, and we just want to recognize them for that.

TMW: How many members does it have?
EE: Currently, we have somewhere around 50 members ranging from all grades. Anyone is welcome to join at anytime!

TMW: What kinds of events have you done recently?
EE: We recently sponsored the first volleyball game of the year, which was also the first game ever in the new Leonard Center. At these events, we make signs and simply cheer to help out our teams. It’s surprising how excited you get when competing if there is actually a crowd there for your support.

TMW: I understand you had some great things planned for homecoming. What is your vision for the week?
EE: Homecoming was a huge week for Macalester. There were themes for each day where if you dressed up like that theme for the day, you got candy from Mac the Scot at lunch. Then, we planned on going to a different sporting event nearly every day or night, and usually had a game set up either before or after the sporting event to get more people involved. This was really important to try and create a sense of community around campus. There are going to be alumni on campus all week, and we needed to show them what Macalester means to us and what a Homecoming should be for them. Our vision is simply to let Mac students have a good time all week, and finish it off with a dance, Saturday night in Kagin ballroom to bring everything together.

TMW: What else do you have planned for the rest of the year/semester?
EE: The rest of the semester we are planning on just going to events and showing our support. Homecoming is going to be our big event for the year, but that doesn’t mean that we still won’t be around campus!

TMW: Anything else you feel important for students to know?
EE: One thing that we are trying to do this year more than last year is support the arts and more non-athletic events. Currently, the Kilt Krew is made mostly of athletes, but we want more people! There are very few representatives from all the other organizations, but we still want to support them. We are going to try and attend more choir concerts, band concerts, etc. We just need those students to help us plan such events.

TMW: What is your favorite thing about Kilt Krew?
EE: My favorite thing about Kilt Krew is the people. They are all friendly enough where you can have a good time at the meetings, yet dedicated enough to get work done when its time for business. It’s a great group.

TMW: and why did you decide to join?
EE: I decided to join because I wanted to be more involved around campus and learn more about what it means to go to Macalester. And I must say, Kilt Krew has given me not only a great perspective on Mac, but also a core group of friends that I can hang out with outside of the meetings.

Kilt Krew meetings are open to all on Monday nights at 10:15, upstairs in the Campus Center.