Siffos's Wake
On Friday, 23 May, Siffos – the student social committee for Public Health Sciences – was laid to rest at the semester’s final Friday bar. The degree programme is moving to Dalgas Avenue, and the board of Siffos saw no possibility of continuing as before. But maybe the committee is just playing dead ...
The semester's final Friday bar also marked the last one ever for the student social committee for Public Health Science, Siffos. After 14 years in Building 1150, Siffos' era ended with a final Friday bar on 23 May – complete with tributes, mourning bands, and a traditional wake. And many came to bid their farewells to the popular Friday bar.
"I would guess that there were around 400-500 guests during the evening," says Nicolai Emil Krogsgaard Thygesen, current board member of Siffos.
Public health science is moving out of the university park
The closure of Siffos is a consequence of cuts to the number of student places in Public Health Science, following the Master's degree reform and the associated dimensioning measures.
In November, Omnibus reported that admissions to the Bachelor's degree programme in Public Health Science would be reduced to 34 places, while Sports Science would be reduced to 48. Since then, however, Health has managed to secure 17 additional places across the faculty.
"12 of these study places have been allocated to us here at Public Health Science, so 46 students will start this summer," says Ida Marie Krabbe Freund, chair of Siffos.
The faculty leadership team has also decided that Public Health Science will be moved to Dalgas Avenue, where Sports Science is already located, from the start of studies in 2025.
Both Siffos members are in their fourth semester. After the summer relocation, they’ll continue attending classes in Building 1150, although their degree program is moving elsewhere.
The soul of Siffos is in the University Park
It’s the current board members of Siffos who have proposed that Siffos as a committee should close. The final decision must then be made by the committee's members at a general meeting.
"It's true that it's not our decision. We're having a general meeting sometime in October, and if anyone wants to take over, they are free to do so. It's our members' final decision," Ida Marie Krabbe Freund says, continuing:
"For us, it's really hard to see how it can work (to continue running Siffos on Dalgas Avenue, ed.), but if anyone thinks they can transfer it (Siffos, ed.) to Dalgas Avenue, they are more than welcome to give it a try," she says.
BeerSiffos Maximus?
However, not content with putting the final nail in Siffos' coffin, the board has also taken an initiative to ensure that the festive spirit at Public Health Science can live on in a new form:
"We have attended the general meeting of the current Beerceps Maximus (the Sports Science student social committee, ed.) and have helped rewrite some of their statutes so that it now becomes a student committee for both Public Health and Sports Science students," Ida Marie Krabbe Freund says.
"Once we've swallowed our pride, I think we're really looking forward to working together," she says.
For years, Siffos' Friday bars served as the grand finale of Friday bar tours in the University Park. The two board members agree that the new Friday bar on Dalgas Avenue will be a Friday bar where you don't come and go as much. But the two also see potential in this:
"I think it will be extremely cool to organise a Friday bar for our own students. We've missed that this year as it has been such a central gathering place," Ida Marie Krabbe Freund says.
However, the Friday bar should not close in on itself, they emphasise:
"We must continue to cultivate our good external relations to maintain our popularity," Nicolai Emil Krogsgaard Thygesen says.
Friendly merger
However, trying to ensure Siffos' survival with a merger with Beerceps Maximus on Dalgas Avenue has not been without its problems, the two board members say.
"We thought we'd just order beer, tend bar and clean up after parties. We're actually not very good at statutes, and some of our statutes were written 14 years ago, when it was never considered that this would happen," Ida Marie Krabbe Freund says.
"So a lot of issues have arisen that we're actually not very good at dealing with," she says.
But the merger is friendly, they emphasise:
"Basically, we're not interested in fighting for space on Dalgas Avenue," Nicolai Emil Krogsgaard Thygesen explains about the planned merger with Beerceps Maximus.
This text is machine translated and post-edited by Cecillia Jensen.