Greetings, Blogosphere:
What do you get when you mix the top industry leaders of ophthalmic and optical products with a dollop of tradeshow consumerism and a dash of student prize giveaways? One epic evening the SCO community affectionately calls, “Optifest.”
For over the past 20+ years, the SCO AOSA Trustees have developed, planned, and organized the annual Opitfest. This year’s event saw over 24 vendors from the ophthalmic and optical industry represented. The SCO community was able to enjoy discounted frames and sunglasses for purchase and optometry’s industry partners were able to educate SCO’s students, faculty, and staff on the newest product innovations and services their organizations have created. While you’d have to travel to an optometry conference to get this kind of industry exposure, AOSA brings the exhibit hall to the SCO campus free of charge, but with all the bang of a larger tradeshow (crowds and freebies included!!).
Planning such a highly anticipated event like Optifest took several months of preparation, but all that early hard work really paid off. And with the help of over 40 classmates volunteering alongside the vendors, any hiccups that might have occurred were quickly resolved before anyone could have been the wiser. From an event organizer’s perspective, I couldn’t have asked for a smoother Optifest. Of course, the AOSA Trustees build upon the successes of each previous Optifest, so I know next years’s event will raise the bar even higher!
I can’t do Optifest justice with a single blog post, but I hope you’ll get a better idea of the event experience with the photos below compliments to SCO’s Communication Director, Jim Hollifield.
I appreciated the entire SCO community’s participation at Optifest 2013, and helping to continue this one-of-a-kind optometry school tradition!
Carpe Diem,
Amy