On Friday, the Student Life Center will transform into the Fear Factory, a haunted house of epic proportions.
From room to room, students will be served spooky themes of ghouls, ghosts and other ghastly creations. Doors open at 8 p.m., but the screams won’t stop until nearly midnight.
Harborside Activities Board (HAB) recruited over 60 volunteers from 15 different clubs and organizations to design the rooms. They will decorate offices throughout the SLC in various themes, offices include Student Government, HAB, Multicultural Affairs and the Crow’s Nest.
Anthony Greggo, the director of special events for HAB, said that this year the board is trying to up the scare factor.
“The haunted house has been a HAB event for many years, but this one is going to take it one step farther,” said Greggo. “We want to make it bigger than anyone ever imagined it in the past.”
The previous haunted houses have not received as much support.
Greggo estimates that maybe 20 to 25 volunteers signed up at last year’s event. He said that volunteers are still wanted as actors and set designers for Friday.
A lot of the students latched onto the idea, Greggo said. And with the extra support, the team could put on something unique.
“This won’t be a child-friendly haunted house,” Greggo said. “We took a lot of inspiration and wanted to make it feel like Halloween Horror Nights.”
The Compass program, which provides support to incoming freshman, was instrumental in building up the Halloween tradition, according to Greggo.
This will be the last year that Greggo, a senior in biomedical science, will participate as the director of special events, and he wanted to kick off the final holiday season with a bang.
“We wanted to not only impress the student body, but show the faculty and administration what we are capable of putting together,” said Greggo.
For college students, Halloween may be less about candy and walking neighborhoods, but their continued imagination shines through by finding other ways to celebrate the holiday.
Groups participating in the haunted house are designing individual rooms, and each group received a budget of $300 to get started.
Greggo hinted that there would be students crafting a room centered on the occult and one based on the horror classic, “The Exorcist.”
Summer Muhar is a freshman marketing major. She has enlisted two other students to participate in the Career Center office upstairs. She said her theme was a bit easier because the room doesn’t have a clear exit or entrance, but she can set up a scene through the window.
“We’ve only needed to use around $50 to make our theme work,” Muhar said.
Muhar said that she’s never been to the theme park Halloween events like Howl-O-Scream or Halloween Horror Nights, but the smaller haunted houses like Hellview Cemetery have inspired her to work on this event.
Muhar is also excited for other students to experience it.
“There are so many different themes throughout the SLC, it’s really something for everyone,” Muhar said.
Halloween is Muhar’s favorite holiday. It’s the one she looks forward to the most because it makes her feel young again, now that she’s a freshman in college.
“It’s my favorite holiday because it’s the one day of the year you can be something you’re not,” Muhar said.
Photo Courtesy of Harborside Activities Board
If students are interested in joining a team, they can contact the Anthony Greggo via email at agreggo@mail.usf.edu.
