The first of its kind in the nation, the award-winning WVUp All Night (UAN) program will celebrate its 20th birthday this weekend in the Mountainlair on Friday and Saturday (March 23 and 24) from 9 p.m. to 1 a.m. The celebration will feature a mobile escape room, comedy show, food, and an obstacle course, among other activities.
Watch parties for the women's and men's basketball games on Friday are also planned.
WVUp All Night was convened in 1998, and 20 years later it is still providing students with multifaceted events each Friday and Saturday during the fall and spring semesters. The program offers attractions from national entertainment companies, first-run movies, comedy clubs, and FREE food throughout the night.
Former vice president for WVU Student Affairs Ken Gray and his staff developed the program to create alternatives to Morgantown’s late night social scene. In the spring of 1998, the first UAN was held at the Mountainlair Student Union, in the heart of the WVU campus. Doug Skaff, a then-21-year-old junior, coined the term "WVUp All Night." Skaff worked tirelessly with Vice President Gray and his staff to develop the late-night program that instantly turned into a success.
During the first year of the program, attendance each night varied between 1,000 to 3,000 students. In the years to follow, it was discovered that 15 percent of students considered UAN when deciding whether to come to WVU. Aside from the national programming attractions, food was one of the selling points for the late-night program.
The program flourished under Gray’s leadership and on September 24, 1998, ABC’s Good Morning America aired a more than five-minute piece centered on how UAN had helped one school mend its party school reputation and bring forth a togetherness on the university campus.
In 2009, the leadership of the program was turned over to Sonja Wilson, Mountainlair senior programming administrator. Under her guidance, the program has become more campus-inclusive offering activities on the Evansdale and Health Sciences campuses.
Student participation in the program has not wavered over the two decades of the program’s existence. Today the program still brings in approximately 1,500-3,000 students per night.
The number of incident reports from the University Police Department have declined from the onset of the program’s existence.
For more information, please contact sonja.wilson@mail.wvu.edu.
For more information visit the WVUp All Night page on The Mountainlair website.