Help on making an anime club...

[uzutake]

I'm making it for a middle school and I need some ideas! So far I have this:

-Watching anime
-Reading manga
-Visiting the local Barnes&Nobles
-BUNCHES of field trips to Japanese shops and stuff
-visiting Japan town
-COMING TO FANIME NEXT YEAR!(if it's in the San Jose Convention Center again...I'm not going to any place far away or anything >>U)
-Fundraisers like buying cheap manga/anime and selling it or bringing in old anime stuff we dont need
-Going to the Cherry Blossom Festival
-Eating Japanese food in the club

And that's it! I need more ideas cuz I showed this to my friend and he thought it was a bit boring. Any other suggestions? Or is this good enough? Bad enough? Too much? >>U

[Tsubasa]

Truth be told, most anime clubs just turn into group screening sessions and some socializing time off on the side.  It's a winning formula that has perpetuated through the decades.

[Chikiru]

Tsubasa's pretty much right. There are some things that might be possible though, such as the group trips you have listed. Since taking over the club at my high school, I'm hoping that the annual Fanime trip becomes a sorta tradition for the club (One more year left to try!). We use the harvest festivals at our school to fundraise, as the whole school participates in that instead of just club members.

It's nice to know these things are starting earlier on, though. =3 Ah, youth...

[EdOfNoName]

If you are really interested in doing more than just showing anime, I have some suggestions at http://www.es3.us/clubs/suggest.php . But I'd suggest stating out simple, figure out how to do one thing at a time well and don't set expectations too high.

If there isn't an anime loving teacher at your school, you might seek out the teen librarian at the city or county library nearest you.

Funimation has a good page on the "traditional" way to make an anime club: http://www.operationanime.com/Main/dsp_starter_kit.htm

ADVfilms has program where they send a sampler DVD and glossy brouchures to qualifying clubs: http://www.advfilms.com/advocatesnew/index.asp

[AnimeEmperor]

I founded a club when I was in highschool and I found it went something like this. After initially setting up the club officers and getting enough members together you should decide when and where to meet. Then you all simply vote on what anime's you want to watch together, and at the start of each meeting take some time to talk about club activities. Usually we would just discuss what events nearbye we wanted to go to. In the off season when there aren't really any events we would just discuss future events or recent anime news. You really don't have to do much to keep an anime club together, as long as you play an anime they want to see they'll show up.

.......it also may have helped that our meetings were held in one of the computer labs and we would surf the net the entire time during meetings to quickly find out information about events.......or watch Naruto.

[lyricaldanichan]

You are brave to try and start up a anime club. But your ideas are solid since you are trying to make it more then sitting around and watching the tv screen.

Just seems like nowadays since it is very easy to get anime thanks to the internet that the whole social aspect is going the way of the dino. Then again I wouldn't be suprised if it is from burn out or becoming older/getting a life outside of fandom.

Anime Clubs seem to work best for the middle/high school crowds since they are not that bitter (yet..) lol.

[Suspicious]

I find the best thing to do at an anime club is just have a social commons area where people can do their own thing.  If you try to turn it into one big video room, people will get bored and leave (or disagree with whatever you're watching and never come back).  Instead, just setup a TV in the corner, and people who want to watch it, watch it.  People who want to draw mingle with the other artists.  Anime discussions in another corner.  So on and so forth.  You end up with a pretty nifty social group where you can go to hang out with.  It's not as structured as other clubs, but I made some of my best friends that way.

...I just realized that my club was a mini convention every lunch period...

[Kegan_Flame]

Truth be told, most anime clubs just turn into group screening sessions and some socializing time off on the side.  It's a winning formula that has perpetuated through the decades.

I run an anime club at my school (high skool)

and that's about what we do....

we also trade manga/anime around and will be attending Fanime as a group next year,....