JustArts: What drove you to work for Student Activities?

Steve Pagios: So I was your typical involved student in college. I was involved in everything, which I really think the Brandeis student can relate to. And I really, really liked working with my [peers] at that point and I was president of my programming board my senior year. So I was kind of advising that group. So I decided, “you know what, I think I can do this.” ... And honestly I heard a lot of good things about [Director of Student Activities, Stephanie Grimes]. She has a very good reputation in our region… And I liked the environment here and I liked the students that I met with and I thought I could see myself here.

JA: How do you like Brandeis and your role here so far?

SP: It’s been a learning curve. I’ve never started a job midyear. So I started this job in January… so I was starting once everyone else already started. So I was just kind of running, catching up to everything. But I’ve liked it. I prefer to be busy so it was nice starting the year off not having a free second and just kind of learning as I went along. Everyone has been super nice. And even now, people will stop by and introduce themselves because they’ve heard my name or whatever ... and I think that just sort of speaks to the community we have at Brandeis and how everyone is welcoming and kind of wants you to feel part of a community.

JA: Can you give us a preview of some of the events that we can look forward to this fall?

SP: On the Student Activities side, we have a couple of cool events. We [had] a hypnotist coming this weekend and next weekend we have a comedian … Arvin Mitchell, who has been on the college circuit for a while. Then we have our bingo and trivia [nights]. So this year, we decided to market it a little differently. So every first Thursday of the month is bingo and every third Thursday is trivia—so a little more consistency when it comes to those things. So those are a couple of things in our office. [With] Student Events, one of the things we’re most excited about is the Fall Concert Series. So we’re doing something a little different there. Instead of having the one, big show in September, we’re having two shows in Levin [Ballroom], two pretty decently sized acts, to provide twice the excitement, twice the programming.

JA: Why did you decide to have two different concerts instead of one?

SP: I think it was a couple of different reasons. One was that we were lucky enough to get Magic! right away. And then they were awesome enough to be picked up by iHeart Radio Music Festival in [Las Vegas,] which happens to be the same day as the day we were going to have them. So Student Events really wanted them and worked out a different day. And I think that there was something with the Fall Concert that Student Events wanted to try something new because the past couple years it might not have gone the best way. I wasn’t here. But I think they just got in this mode to try something new. So this kind of came about and hopefully it will be a nice, intimate show—750 people there—but still being in that small venue, feeling like there’s not a bad seat in the house.

JA: How do you see the role of Student Activities fitting within the Brandeis community?

SP: At the end of the day, we are here, I think, to support students and student organizations. And I think we do a good job at that. I think we want to try to do a better job at that, meaning that we really want to let student organizations know that if they have questions on anything, they can come to us ... I think still doing different programming, different ways to engage students, getting the same people over and over is awesome—but how can we hit those people that aren’t involved and get them involved, so being a little more creative, ways like that. I think I would love to see more co-sponsoring within our division ... I think we have a lot of good people who do their jobs very well. So let’s get them all together to put on some amazing event or program or informational session … [It’s] always not being stagnant, and instead being fluid. We are always kind of learning as a department things that work, things that don’t work and staying up with the times.