Park University’s Technology Fee Committee has introduced a new campus-specific application called “Crew.” Crew is available via desktop or as a free app that can be downloaded to iOS or Android devices. It was implemented by the Park Student Government Association and paid for using the technology fee funds.

“The idea of Crew was to connect students – online, at other campuses and at the home campus – together across majors,” said Ryan Zitter, vice president of the Park Student Government Association and president of the Technology Fee Committee.

“This app works intricately with your current class schedule, and you can add people by the classes you’re in. So it’s much easier to facilitate group projects, it works more intimately with the actual academic side of Park University rather than just Student Life. It acts as a deeper medium than just a calendar for things that are happening at Park.”

Crew’s many capabilities include a social media-like feed that students, staff and organizations can post to, a calendar of school events, discussion areas where you can create a group chat with friends, a study timer and uploading capabilities. Additionally, it provides a way to contact clubs and organizations and view the active clubs on campus. Anissa Martinez, the public relations chairperson for PSGA, is currently creating a campaign to raise students’ awareness of Crew and implement it more widely on campus.

“With Crew,” Martinez said, “you can create events, you can do polls, you can attach files, you can do a lot on here – which I personally really like. You can access your Park email, it connects to the Park calendar … you can even sell things in the marketplace area, like your used textbooks.”

Along with Martinez, Zitter reiterated the app’s benefits.

“This acts as a way to specifically engage groups of students with each other but is only open to Park University students,” he said. “It allows you to use it as social media, but geared toward academics.”

When logging in to Crew, students will be asked their class schedule, the organizations they belong to, their major and their interests. This helps Crew personalize the student’s experience a bit and can help the student contact others with similar interests or within the same major.

To get started, students can visit crew.park.edu or download the free application by searching “Park University Crew” in their operating system’s application store. The log-in information is the same as MyPark or Canvas credentials.

For more information, listen to what the people implementing Crew have to say about it: Crew App; Interview with the Experts