by MEGHAN SACKMAN, Staff Writer

The Biology Club took over the Quad on Oct. 28 with tables informing student on a range of diseases and ailments, in an attempt to better inform students on the nature of pathogens.           

Manhattan College biology students set up five different tables, each with its own poster describing a specific disease. These diseases were selected by the group on the basis of their importance in the life of college students.

The club set out to inform students with their informational posters that consisted of causes and effects of the specific disease, as well as some less known fun facts about each. The Biology Club set up the information so that each disease had a quiz with the information from each and students that got the answer correct won a prize.

The topics covered on the posters included dental hygiene, diabetes, STDs, Alcohol and smoking, as well as commonly discussed diseases such as Ebola and Zika.

“It’s not just for college students, it’s kind of for everyone in general to learn about health concerns that people just don’t know about. You hear about Zika but you don’t understand or have any idea what it is,” Vice President Chris Delabastide said.

Club member Alex Constantine discussed another motive for the event: the further enhancement and progression of the Biology Club itself. He explained how the Biology Club is a place for students to meet and hang out.

The Biology Club is a “unifying thing for all these science majors, mostly biology majors, to come together and talk about biology and help each other out tutoring wise.” Constantine said. “We have a presence here other than engineering; that there’s a science presence on the MC campus.”

After communal brainstorming of on campus events that could achieve this end recognition the club came up with “Bio Squad on the Quad” about a month ago, in which this poster event was included.

The club members pointed out that it is unfortunate but true that these diseases greatly affect kids on college campuses due to their description by Constantine as “one big cesspool of germs”. These posters of facts are the Biology club’s way of preventing these things from becoming issues for students. Passing on this knowledge is a way of helping others.

“I just joined this year but I’m looking to learn a lot more about different aspects of Biology. I want to become a doctor so I’m interested in learning all these diseases…I feel like that will help,” said Angelo Materia, a new member of the club. “The topics we specifically picked pertain definitely to college students…so it’s just something to keep in mind.”

Overall, the Biology club accomplished its task of spreading awareness and prevention of diseases that are important for college students to know about as well as make the biology community of Manhattan College more present on campus.

“We are trying to be more prominent on campus so look around for more events throughout the year,” Delabastide said.