Whitney Harrigan paced through a Watson Hall floor searching for the room she had to go to. But she and the other First Year Players members soon realized the number they had was for a bathroom. Their plan shifted. They started looking at doors for the name of the person they wanted to meet.

The group arrived as that person left her room. She was confused by what was occurring and then the FYP members explained someone sent a singing gram and told her his name.

Her face turned bright red.

“We don’t know what the relationship was,” Harrigan said, “but we like to speculate afterward.”

Harrigan’s Valentine’s Day was spent parading around the Syracuse campus to deliver singing grams. The senior accounting and finance dual major also serves as the finance director of First Year Players, a registered student organization that will perform the play “Big Fish” on April 13, 14 and 15. So Harrigan spent the past several weeks planning FYP’s annual event.

“My job was to coordinate everything,” Harrigan said.

Each day last week and on Monday of this week, Harrigan organized members to table in the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications and Martin J. Whitman School of Management.

For the first time, she said, singing grams were delivered to South Campus and off-campus housing. That added more challenges and more planning for Harrigan. Once all the purchase were made, Harrigan used Excel spreadsheets to organize which of the 26 singers would go to which locations. She had to consider the best pairings given singing ability, access to transportation and timing. The hardest part, Harrigan said, was transitions in between shifts as some singers were occasionally late and the rotations were slightly thrown off.

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The singing grams cost $3 while it cost $2 to purchase a hand-made yellow tissue paper daffodil, which fit with “Big Fish’s” theme. The organization raised around $200 in total for nearly 50 performances throughout about four hours in the late afternoon and evening.

While FYP receives money as a registered student organization, Harrigan said for a big production, extra resources are valuable.

“Things always change. You never know what’s going to happen,” Harrigan said. “So it’s important to have a lot of money in our fundraising account to fall back on.”

The four songs that people could choose from were “L-O-V-E” by Nat King Cole, “Can You Feel The Love Tonight” from “The Lion King,” Love Is An Open Door” from “Frozen” and “Candy Shop” by 50 Cent. Harrigan said “Candy Shop” was by far the most popular and it usually led to smiles and laughs.

“It’s a stressful day because it’s a lot of coordinating, and especially for the first time, it’s been very stressful for me,” Harrigan said, “but a really rewarding thing. I think everybody has a lot of fun with it.”

Published on February 15, 2017 at 12:54 am

Contact Paul: pmschwed@syr.edu | @pschweds