Jamie Nicholson | Student Life

Campus Life’s “Tuesday Tea @ 3” event, previously hosted on a weekly basis in the Danforth University Center (DUC), will now occur once a month during the spring 2023 semester. Tuesday Tea will happen on the third Tuesday of each month and will continue to operate in Tisch Commons from 3 to 5 p.m.

Serving hot tea and scones, the event provides students with an afternoon break from work and classes. According to Peggy Hermes, Associate Director of Campus Life, Tuesday Tea “is a partnership with different student groups, departments, and sponsors” that sign up to host the event.

“We bring folks in to have tea, and then there is a host [organization] that gets to highlight their involvement opportunities,” Hermes said. 

Tuesday Tea is a tradition at WashU, one that “has been going on for about 12 years,” Hermes said.

“Tuesday Tea started when the Danforth University Center was looking for programming to activate the building,” Rob Wild, Associate Vice Chancellor for Student Affairs, said. 

The decision to change Tuesday Tea from a weekly event to a monthly event was intended to make space for other Campus Life events and activities, Hermes explained.

“When we were looking at the rest of our Spring 2023 programming budget, [altering the Tuesday Tea schedule] was a decision we made to re-imagine programming,” she said. “We wanted to make sure that we were emphasizing other types of programming, while still maintaining Tuesday Tea.”

Wild explained that Campus Life receives a small programming budget from the University, as the department’s main function is not to host their own events. Therefore, Campus Life wants to “be innovative and try different things” with their programming funds, especially after the lull in student activity due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Coordinator for Programming and Marketing Jasmine James added that Campus Life is exploring their programming options. Most recently, Campus Life hosted several events for their Winter Welcome Week, such as a trivia night.

Although programming funds are currently being allocated to other types of activities, Hermes said that the Tuesday Tea schedule change is a “pilot study” for Campus Life to see what students want.

“We [are curious] to see if [Tuesday Tea] is an event that students want us to do weekly,” she said. “We want to get a feel for what the student body really wants from our programming.”

Many students are upset with Campus Life’s decision.

Sophomore Grant McIntyre claims to be “devastated” by Tuesday Tea happening only once a month.

“It is my favorite campus tradition,” he said.

Junior Avery Mccammon says she is disappointed that Tuesday Tea is switching to a monthly schedule.

“While I understand that Campus Life does not have a large budget to program events, Tuesday Tea is such a great tradition at WashU,” she said. “I love seeing my friends at Tuesday Tea events and appreciate the study break, so I’m sad that it will be a less frequent thing.”

One student even went as far as to create a change.org petition to “make Tuesday Tea weekly again.” So far, the petition has amassed 55 signatures.

The next Tuesday Tea event is on Feb. 21 in Tisch Commons. Despite the event’s new schedule, Tuesday Tea is not going anywhere.

“Tuesday Tea has been a huge success,” Wild said. “We did not eliminate it, we are just scaling it back to try other things.”