"Young Life" Club at AUCA Dorm

January 16, 2017

The founder of the club, Farkhad Musazov, shared his experience working with the club:

Please, tell about yourself. Department, year of study, your goals.

I am Farkhad Musazov; I was born in Tokmok city, Kyrgyzstan. I studied in NGA 2014-2015 and now I am a student of the sociology department at AUCA. I like being a part of society, I like to create events and participate in them. In my time at AUCA, I’ve been involved in social life not only on campus but also in many different events outside. I can say that I am addicted to participating—if I do not have plans, I immediately get bored. As a result, I was already on Dean’s list for extracurricular activities my freshman year. However, people could say my active social life makes me forget about studying. To that, I say “NO.” A social life gives me motivation and experience extremely relevant to my studies, and I can prove it with the Dean’s list for outstanding studying. I try to be active alongside studying well, because I could not live without either one of these areas of my life.

What is the Young Life club about?

Young Life is a club created for students living in the dorm. Of course, non-dorm students are more than welcome to join as well. Our club is one in which students can feel united as a family. Every Friday evening the organizers gather students downstairs in the dorm. Traditionally, we start with games. In Young Life, students communicate through fun games and team building activities. We organize games that are both funny and intellectual. At the end of each game, winners get prizes like pens, t-shirts, cups, notebooks and CDs from AUCA. After the games, all the students sit down on the carpet and watch an English movie we choose through our Young Life Facebook Group. When the movie is over, we hold a discussion of what we thought about the movie. Students share their opinions and listen to others’ as well. During these activities, students improve their leadership skills and become open-minded. The Young Life Club is all about having fun, expanding friend groups, swapping worldviews, improving intercultural communication, and sharpening critical thinking. Moreover, Young Life is also about relaxing after a long stressful week. Many students say, “the club helps [us] get a portion of our energy for the next week.”

Where did you get the idea to start the Young Life club?

In 2014, I was accepted to the NGA program and I met many different people. I was living with a majority of them in the dormitory, but after some time I noticed that students start to separate into small groups. Many of them did not communicate with others. I wanted to know everyone, but it was hard since so many NGA students were from the regions and were shy. I thought, “how can I break this barrier and let students be and feel free to communicate with each other?” So the idea was born, I wanted to make a club where students can come, moreover to make so that they want to come. After much brainstorming I arrived at the Young Life club.

Young Life structure is very easy to understand. In my club we have fun, and we use fun in order to study. The club held in English so students can improve their speaking and listening skills.  Since students study hard, we have our club meetings Friday evenings so that they can enjoy their time without worrying about going to university in the morning.

We have two parts to the club: first is games. We play different games and competitions to give students the opportunity to get to know each other, also to improve their leadership skills, critical thinking spirit.  After each game, we give the winners prizes provided by AUCA’s PR office and the NGA administration, encouraging the students to be active during the club.

The second part of our club is movie watching. Throughout the week, we choose several movies and post them to our Facebook page so students can vote on which one we’ll watch. All the movies we have are in English language with English subtitles so it helps develop students’ English language skills.  

Our get-togethers are never mandatory: if you want to come—you come, if not—you don’t. Nevertheless, we usually we have many participants, and since our club is in the dormitory we have many international participants.

I am the head of the club, and it’s been in operation for three years already. I’ve tried to make it interesting each week for the past three academic years. My first year, I did everything myself, but when I became an undergraduate of AUCA and had less free time, I was fortunate enough to find students living in the dormitory who were active and ready to make life in the dorm more interesting. Last year I found four very good NGA students of NGA (Stas, Elzat, Aidai and Aibek) to lead the club. This year, I have four more students, some of them freshmen, some of them NGA students, and even an international student on Young Life’s team. My current team is Sevara Tadzhibaeva, Akmaljon Akhmedjonov, Jyldyz Muratbekova and Meerim Zhan. This whole year they are going to lead Young Life, while I give advice as a coordinator.

What are your future plans for the club?

For the future we do not have big plans. We are all busy with studying and therefore cannot dedicate much time to the club, especially me because I also participate in other events. But I sincerely do want to expand the club. Over the past three years, I’ve noticed how students have changed: they are closer and more open minded. These are measures that the club’s aims are being met and that it is bringing positive change to the residents of the dormitory. I want to expand the club in to all AUCA students and even non-AUCA students who want to find friends or have new experience.

What makes Young Life unique?

The uniqueness of Young Life is its unique Community. Our club has created a community where each member can open him or herself to the world the way they are. Young Life gives its members happiness and a sense of family. This is a unique way for the students to adapt to a new society and get engaged with the public, especially since not everybody is living with their family. Our members came from different regions within the Kyrgyzstan and from many other countries like Tajikistan, Afghanistan, China, Uzbekistan, Korea. Students have the opportunity to exchange their extraordinary cultures with each other by organizing many kinds of events in order to celebrate holidays of different countries of our members and see this beautiful world with a wider perspective. We are becoming a Big International Family. In this way, Young Life makes the world around us better place to live.

 

How has the club helped you improve your own life?

In our lives, we always search for ways of improving ourselves physically and mentally. The Young Life Club is one of those places which help me in various ways in my life.

For example, clubs are always fun, and you can widen your worldview and gain skills in order to become a good leader. I became a better public speaker because of participating in various clubs. It also advanced my leadership skills. Participating in clubs makes you a stronger leader in any area.

Another benefit of our club is that I’ve learned a lot from others and get to exchange my own ideas with other club members. One of the best things that I experienced in my club life is that you build relationships with many people. Nothing is more valuable than a relationship, and participating and leading a club allows you to build a new relationship with many people. Whether this relationship is peer-based or work-based, you gain a new life-impacting connection with someone. And when you build a new relationship with one person, you create a web of interlocking relationships with others, which always makes your life more interesting.

I have always liked sharing my thoughts and knowledge with others. This club has become the best resource for me to make that a daily reality.

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