Conquest aims to unite Trojans before UCLA game


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The Undergraduate Student Government, the USC Concerts Committee and the Conquest Committee organized USC’s 2016 Conquest Thursday in McCarthy Quad.

The event featured a Ferris wheel, food trucks, a Bruin bonfire and a concert, among other attractions.

Before the concert, headlined by artists AlunaGeorge and Majid Jordan, student groups like the Trojan Marching Band and dance teams performed on stage as part of the rally. Trojan Pride conducted the traditional burning of a UCLA sign and Bruin bear in preparation for USC’s football game against UCLA in the upcoming weekend.

“The activity that I’m most excited about by far is the Ferris wheel,” said Jacob Lester, a freshman majoring in English. “I expected all other aspects of Conquest, but the Ferris wheel adds an interesting flair to the whole event, and I’m interested to see what else Conquest has to offer.”

Food trucks included Farmer’s Belly, The Boba Truck, Sweet E’s Bake Shop, Made in Brooklyn NY Pizza, Jogasaki Sushi Burrito and Wings N’ Waffles.

The Conquest Committee spent about a year organizing logistics and designing Conquest 2016 to be distinct from other previous years’ events. According to the event’s marketing chair Eshaya Siriwardane and graphics design chair Emily Lu, organizing the event required much communication with both school authorities and outside organizations to become a success.

“We really tried to make this year’s Conquest different by rebranding it,” said Ruwandi Siriwardane, a sophomore majoring in business administration. “We really wanted this event to be about all of us coming together as a Trojan family to feel the USC spirit before we head into our big game against UCLA.”

Lu said that the Conquest Committee added several activities this year to increase spirit even before the day of the event.

“We tried to imitate Ellen [Degeneres]’s 12 Days of Giveaways before Christmas with Conquest this year,” Lu said. “We gave out freebies such as food items and merchandise over the course of the week to pump everyone up for Conquest, and we’ll be announcing the winner of two VIP tickets to an upcoming concert as well. Beyond our week before Conquest, however, we also had an overall change of image — in our Facebook event and posts — we’ve incorporated a special theme for this year with the Victory sign in a glitch-style video.”

The Conquest Committee’s efforts have not only been to increase student participation and spirit for the USC-UCLA rivalry, but also to give students a greater sense of unity as active members of the Trojan Family. Joshua Chang, a senior majoring in business administration and an organizer of Conquest, added that one of the most important goals of Conquest is to increase student energy.

“At the end of the day, we want the Trojans to feel part of a bigger movement,” Chang said. “I think Conquest offers that energy to make us feel more as a team and more excited about the upcoming game.”