CWU celebrated its students on May 22 for SWEECY Day. An array of lively students flooded the southside of campus for a plethora of food, games, friends and live music.

“This is one of my favorite events as a whole,” 2025-2026 ASCWU President Hondo Acosta-Vega said. 

The activities started early in the day with a pair of on-campus service projects at the Butterfly Garden and the Wildcat Farm from 10 a.m. to noon.

Following an hour intermission, it was time to move to the front of the SURC, where there was a dunk tank with ASCWU members inside, a tie dye station, yard games and other activities for the students to take part in from 1-3 p.m. 

Finally, it was time for the big event. Starting at 5 p.m., Star Anna made her way to the stage to perform for just short of an hour until the headliners Los Shadows began their performance. The food festival was punctuated by the sounds of live music and students laughing.

The food festival gave students a break from a repetitive diet of campus consumption. Among the large variety of options were nachos, barbecue ribs, cheese cake, ice cream and sno cones.

“We’ve been planning this since the late summer and all throughout the academic year with all of our campus partners. 88.1 brought the concert to life, dining brought the food and campus activities have been really helpful with ASCWU. We decided to do a collaboration of SWEECY Day from us along with student appreciation. We have an amazing event going on right now and it’s amazing to see all of us go through all the stress and tears from planning to now see it all coming to fruition beautifully.”

Acosta-Vega spoke about how this allows himself and other students to briefly sit back and forget about some of the difficult news that has arisen this quarter. “I think everyone can attest that it’s been a really rough quarter for everybody with everything going on and all the different changes happening. Being able to take off my student government hat and just enjoy this event as a student is something I’m looking forward to.” 

Sophomore Abel Roduarte was very active at the dunk tank making sure to dunk Acosta-Vega, current ASCWU President Malik Cantu and current ASCWU Executive Vic

e President Nick Villa. “The dunk tank was so fun. I was able to get all the people I wanted to get for the most part and it was very cool seeing everyone come together and have a nice day,” Roduarte said. “The tie dye was super fun too. The staff were really helpful as well and this all just shows student appreciation.”

SWEECY Day took many heads to put together. However, Acosta-Vega gave a special thanks to the person who he saw revive the full day event a few years ago. “SWEECY Day started with my predecessor Charles Johnson two years ago when he was senate speaker. He brought it back from the archives and so we kept it going. It’s really thanks to him that we brought this event back,” Acosta-Vega said.

According to a 2016 article from The Observer, SWEECY Day was a tradition that emerged after World War II. 

“I just appreciate all of our campus partners for coming together. We had our butterfly garden service project and Wildcat farm service project in the morning, we had so much fun in the afternoon and now we have this great way to wrap up the day,” Acosta-Vega said.

Grad students Danielle Hegarty and Natalie Hamill have seen this event happen at CWU in the past and noticed all the different food options at their disposal. “I feel like there’s a variety of different foods that they are offering compared to the past,” Hamill said.

“I second that because of course they have their standard burgers but they did bring back the chili chicken nachos which are fire. But I also have friends who are vegetarian and I even have food allergies myself, so it’s nice to see the variety of options. I really appreciate that,” Hegarty added.

On a day where there was free food, free drinks, free music and other free items, sophomore Dylan Asio made sure to not miss his chance at something free. “Dude, it’s been so sick. I came here mainly for the [Monster Energy], I love free things, I’m obviously not going to say no to it,” Asio said. “I love the music too, it is super good and it really looks like everyone is having a good time.”

Jayden Hades, a freshman helping out with crowd management had a message for those who chose to stay in during SWEECY Day. “This is the most important event of the quarter … If you’re in your dorm, get the fuck out!”

“We have amazing vocalists and bands here for the concert, the food is always great. I just want to make sure that the students know we appreciate them. We even have a whole seating area which is really awesome. We have lawn games, amazing food and amazing people. It’s such a good way to wrap up the year as we go into the final two to three weeks,” Acosta-Vega said.