The IDEAL Freshman Leadership program guided first-year students through a jungle-themed exploration filled with teamwork exercises, self-discovery and a murder mystery Sept. 5.

“It’s a kind of taste as to what we’re [IDEAL] about, but it’s also just a great way of having fun. And so it was just something, like, quirky that we thought would get a lot of people to learn about IDEAL and then have some fun in the process,” senior alumni leader Caleb Jenkins said.

The Ronnie Williams Student Center event began with a large discussion about self-identity while attending UCA.

“It’s kind of like a way to kind of get to know who they are, and kind of get to build like themselves and how they are on campus,” junior alumni leader Anna Herrin said. “The whole point of IDEAL is to kind of grow as a person.”

Each student was given a sheet of paper with an activity titled, “The U Zoo,” to help discover the strongest aspects of their personality. These could range from different descriptives such as competitive and easy-going to detailed and sensitive.

Once the students finished the sheet, they split off into four groups: lion, dolphin, koala and eagle. Each group was defined by the personality traits in the “U Zoo” activity.

Jenkins said, “They [IDEAL] just really wanted to do something that could kind of allow them to learn a little bit more about themselves.”

After splitting off, each group worked together to make a chart of likes and dislikes. The groups then had their answers checked with a pre-written key to see how close the groups were to accurately describing themselves according to their animal.

For example, some of the traits of the koala group included patience, sincerity and a relaxed nature.

After a handful of laughs, the groups sat down for the final activity of the evening: the Student Leadership Wildlife Extravaganza Murder Mystery.

The freshmen were tasked to uncover who killed the four IDEAL animals during the Wildlife Extravaganza event, held by IDEAL donors.

To uncover who the culprit was, students played four games outside of the student center to earn clues to piece together the mystery.

One of the games, run by Jenkins, who played the event manager, was a team exercise where freshmen had to stand together on an orange sheet and try to flip it over without stepping off.

“I think that was really cool to see how they started off really hesitant. I think everyone was telling me, like, ‘Oh, this can’t be done,’ like, asking if other groups have done it. And then by the end of it, they were like, ‘Okay, we’ve got this.’ So it was really cool to see their progress from the beginning to the end and getting to be an integral part of that,” Jenkins said.

Another game included green bandanas that represent lily pads. Each animal group was given a limited number of lily pads, which they would have to toss across a “river” and then step across it without their feet leaving the lily pads. The final student of the groups was given their own bandana and forced to walk across the lily pads blindfolded, only able to use the voices of their teammates to get them across.

Freshman Kaitlyn Wright said, “I loved the lily pad game, I kind of wish he [an alumni leader] made me blind in the last second.”

Among the four games, the freshmen were also given a debrief round, where they could discuss the clues that they had received so far and attempt to solve the mystery.

Over 60 freshmen came to the event.

“It was a lot crazier than I expected. We had a lot more people show up than we thought, and it was so much more fun than I would have thought,” Herrin said. “We had a lot to do. We had to make up some fun things to do in between. We had to pull out chairs because we had some people show up. We had to make up games on the spot. But it went really well. I think I really got to meet a lot of new freshmen and get to know who they are and things like that. And I feel like everyone kind of bonded in a way. I think most people are excited for next week.”

Upon completing the games, the students were led back inside and given a few more minutes to uncover the killer.

After a few guesses from each group, the killer was revealed to be the event manager.

“I feel like you could’ve made an argument about anyone, but we were right about the event planner framing the other guys,” Wright said.

IDEAL’s next freshmen interest meeting will be a game of battleship held in the HPER Center pool Sept. 12.

Applications for the IDEAL freshman leadership team are due Sept. 24.

The application can be found at uca.edu/lead/ideal/.