Hello everybody, I am a student at Ryerson University Toronto. I want to start my own club for Magic since they don't have one yet.

I need some advice on what kind of activities to do, how would I get someone to sponsor, and such for starting a magic club.

Thank you very much

Back when I was in college the Dorms had a program for students to teach classes on whatever they wanted. You submitted and idea and they approved (or not) the class. Everything from kayaking to various arts and crafts. I did one on magic. Turned into an informal gathering on a regular basis. See if your univeristy has antyhing like that.

Otherwise check with Student Government. In the US, almost every college has a student government set up, and they'll sponsor various clubs...young republicans, toastmasters, etc. They may sponsor you.

Good luck

Toronto has a plethora of famous magicians that you should contact, and have them visit your club once you get started. Toronto is very fertile magic territory.

I am toying with the idea of starting a magic / mentalism club in my university town, Bloomington IN... any further feedback and ideas to add to the above?

I started my own when I was at Michigan State. It actually ran pretty successfully; we would get more people at our meeting than the local IBM ring!

First, know the rules on making a student org. I was fortunate that one of our IBM Ring members was also a university staff member, so he was our sponsor. You'd probably be able to find a sponsor in the theater or psychology department.

Second, get the word out. My university had a huge student org. fair at the beginning of the year, so we'd have a table and handouts, and naturally, demonstrations. We'd do a few shows on campus, too and made sure it'd get covered by the university paper as well has having a few "about our club" flyers to hand out. Also, we set up a web account through the university, so we could have a subdomain name under the main msu.edu domain.

Third, make sure you get members committed to magic. Nothing kills a magic club faster then focusing on rules, bylaws, and parliamentary procedure. Keep it focused on learning and practicing magic!

Fourth, make sure you have a successor in place to avoid getting "founder's syndrome" - when they guy who started the club leaves or graduates, the club will wither and die. That's what happened to my club - as soon as I graduated, the club didn't keep going because nobody had quite the same drive and energy as I did.

That's my best advice!