Northwest College’s campus exploded back to life this week following the return of the annual Kick-Off Weekend celebration to mark the beginning of the 2026-2027 school year.

Events ranging from laser tag in the library to a water war on the lawn between the student center and Yellowstone Building continue to engage new students each year.

At the heart of Kick-Off Weekend’s success is Northwest’s longtime residence and campus life coordinator, Chris Dugger. He has been responsible for organizing student activities for nearly 15 years.

Dugger was born in Cody to Powell natives but was raised in Douglas. After graduating high school, his father, Curtis, encouraged him to study where he studied: Northwest College. While Chris pursued music technology and music education, he began to fall in love with campus activities working as a resident assistant. After graduating in the spring of 2012, he opted to continue to work at Northwest as a residence life specialist the succeeding fall semester.

Since then, Dugger has been in charge of facilitating Kick-off Weekend officially for more than a decade as the Residence Life Coordinator and head of the Student Activities board.

“For me, being able to work with students and being able to engage with them right out of high school is super cool. Everybody goes through it because one minute you’re living with your parents and doing high school, and then the next day you aren’t anymore and you have to figure it out.” Dugger said. “Being able to connect with students in that crucial time frame gives you the chance to really make a difference in a student’s life.”

Dugger keeps himself busy as the staff leader of the campus Swing Dance Club, the Range Club, the Humans vs. Zombies Club and the Trap, Skeet and Hunting Club. He also serves as Northwest’s esports coach, the head of the Student Activities board and as the resident director of Lewis and Clark Hall.

Dugger prides himself on being able to provide students with entertainment that the college can maintain, like the new laser tag system that student activities procured ahead of the school year.

“Instead of bringing someone in to do the event, we fought and pushed to buy the system, and now, the college will be able to utilize the system for the next 15 years,” Dugger said. “I’ve really tried to get things for the college that we can continue to use so that, as the years go on, it’ll be less costly for us to run things.”

The Kick-Off Weekend events are meant to serve as a primer to activities that students can find on campus across the school year.

One of the most anticipated events from students is the rafting trip that begins below the Shoshone River Bridge in Cody, following the river for 6 miles to Corbett Bridge between Cody and Powell. According to Dugger, this was the highest turnout for the rafting event in the past three years.

Although Student Activities typically must work harder to keep students coming to events past the weekend, Dugger remains optimistic that events like the performance from mentalist Wayne Hoffman and the bingo event to round out festivities continue to draw bigger crowds.

“Usually we have to fight to get people to come to some stuff because they’ve started figuring out friend groups. They’re starting to hang out with people and learning so it makes it a little harder to get people,” he said.

This year, Residence Life will begin tracking attendance for participating students in an attempt to meet students and encourage them to keep going to events. However, across Dugger’s tenure, he has found that strict metrics aren’t necessarily an indicator of how they’re engaging with students.

“I don’t want to put it like ‘we want 20 people at every event’ because that doesn’t really matter. What matters is that students have fun, they learn something, connect with somebody, or just have a genuine, cool experience,” Dugger added. “We’ve got to get people, we need to get them hooked and we want them to stay engaged and continue to do stuff.”

Dugger has incorporated this approach into his philosophy for training his resident assistants across campus to engage with students.

“If you see someone that’s just sitting there by themselves, go talk to them, go find them, go interact with them, and maybe you could be that person that keeps them at Northwest College.”

Occupancy in the residence halls has fallen by 11% from last year to roughly 265 students, a change largely credited to the closures of Colter and Cody halls and national enrollment trends, according to data from the college. Dugger sees himself and his staff as the frontline in keeping students around throughout the year and staying involved in the Powell community.

“Most of our events are free to attend for the community as well. They come for the bigger events in the Nelson Performing Arts Center and for athletics, but it’d be cool to see them here for the other events too, and interact with the students.”

“I think with us being a small town, it’s important to have the connection between the community and the campus, which is why Paint the Town Red is such a big deal. It’s our big ‘hoorah, let’s connect and do stuff.’ But we should really have that Paint the Town Red philosophy all year.”

The ninth annual Paint the Town Red will be hosted in downtown Powell on Aug. 28 from 4-9 p.m. and will feature live music, food trucks, and activities for all ages. For more information for events hosted by Student Activities and around Northwest College, visit nwc.edu/experience/student-activities.html.