Relate: Open Mic Night gives students chance to connect to each other

On Feb. 6, Nicholls State University hosted the first Relate: Open Mic Night of the semester in Danos theater, and the theme for this event was perseverance in honor of Black History Month.

The event started in 2011, when speech professor Farren Clark wanted to host an event different from what he did in the classroom.

“I wanted to provide something that I didn’t have consistently when I was a student,” Clark said.

The open mic night started as a way for students to express themselves in a more creative way. Students from across campus gathered to showcase their different talents. Those talents varied from dance, poetry, singing and stand-up comedy.

“It’s a lot of relatable material, and you might see that same person down the hallway, but you don’t know they actually connect with you through the material and what they have been through,” Ashantian Smith, host of Relate, said.

The event gave students a chance to connect with classmates in a way they never would be able to during normal class times.

This month’s open mic night featured Odd?Rod, a storyteller from Jacksonville, Fla. Odd?Rod used his poetry to tell the story of how he struggled with a mother addicted to drugs, a father who was absent and coming out of a neighborhood that sold drugs, while doing everything he could to avoid the fate of his friends. He shared his story to connect with students and spread the message of hope.

“Sometimes we can lose the connections with one another, and we don’t realize that others have stories, too,” Clark said.

There are two more scheduled Relate: Open Mic nights for the spring semester, set to take place on March 25 and April 17 at 7 p.m. The themes for the next two events have not been decided yet, but any material is acceptable.