KXTR The Planet joins the Tarleton Galaxy for Game Night

BY BROOKLYN MCKINNEY / Multimedia Journalist

KXTR The Planet is getting ready to join forces with the Tarleton Math Club once a month on Fridays to bring students a night of fun, games, prizes and free food.

“The reason we do game nights is because it is meant to be promotional for the radio station, but another reason is we’ve been in the math building for probably about 15 to 20 years now, and we’ve never really done anything with the Math Department,” Lance McFarlin, General Manager of KXTR The Planet said.

A shared interest in board games between McFarlin and a group of math professors at Tarleton State University sparked this unlikely partnership. The Math Club has been steadily growing its collection, and McFarlin alone owns at least 500 board games.

“With Lance, the way we even got teamed up is because he saw us after our little game afternoons, like loading the board games back into our cars and he was like, ‘Hey! Are y’all having a board game hang out?’ I was like, ‘Yeah, just the math teachers’,” Courtney Holland, a math professor, said. “And he’s like, well, what would you think about teaming up and offering this to students? So that’s how it all started.”

KXTR has been helping the Math Club host student game nights since the fall of 2022. The radio station staff is responsible for setting up and buying chips, drinks and cool giveaways while Math Club professors pitch in for pizza, desserts and additional prizes.

Students receive tickets for a raffle drawing at the end of the night. According to McFarlin, the radio station has given away a total of 14 record players since the start of this event.

“Giving away record players with records is cool. I like that somebody gets to take that record player home and just immediately use it, you know?” McFarlin said.

Courtney Holland enjoys connecting with students and sharing her passion for board games.

“Most people come in, and they’ve only ever played Monopoly, Yahtzee; like your classic growing-up games,” Holland said. “And they don’t even realize that there’s this whole other world of board games that are super interactive and super fun.”

However, game nights are not just for board games. The radio station has also invested in a Nintendo Switch to attract more students.

“When we first started, the Switch was in the same room. But they were playing it up on the projector, and they would get really loud because they were like excited in their races or battles,” Holland said. “So, we moved them to another classroom so they could be as loud as they want in there and not overtake the people trying to like talk in their games.”

Game nights can even be fun for those who don’t like video games or board games. There is something for everyone.

“I’d say most people play a lot of cards/party games. For that type of environment party games are really the right kind of game like Exploding Kittens and Taco Cat or whatever,” McFarlin said.

This event has opened a world of opportunities for students and staff alike.

“Doing events is a really big part of doing radio. That’s how a lot of commercial stations make a lot of money,” McFarlin said. “So, it’s a good way for the student employees here to get experience regularly planning and executing events.”

Students have not only loved the opportunity to play games, get free food and win prizes, but also the lively atmosphere.

Gabby Darby, a freshman studying kinesiology at Tarleton, said that her favorite thing about game night was meeting new people.

The combined efforts of the Math Club and KXTR to build a sense of community with Tarleton students have seemingly paid off.

“We were pretty excited because one of the other math people gave extra credit, and she said that her students had to stay for 30 minutes, and they could get it. But they all ended up staying two hours,” Holland said.

The first game night of the semester will be held on Aug. 23 at 5:30 p.m. in the Math building room 125.

For more information, go to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EF-fYTr_Xes, or https://calendar.tarleton.edu/theplanet/all or follow them on Instagram @theplanet100.7.