Students from the Temple Tech College Baptist Group from Louisiana Tech University were at Mesa College on Feb. 28 to probe the minds of Mesa students.

The group, working for two local churches – the Calvary Baptist Church and Ethnos Church – anchored 10 large white poster boards outside the school cafeteria. Each poster board was labeled with a different topic with a line drawn down the center to separate the board in two sides – one side labeled “HATE” and the other side labeled “LOVE”. Hanging from the poster boards were black markers for students to write comments on the topics, ranging from Family to Money to Church.

The group also posed a four question survey to Mesa students to tap into their beliefs and likes and dislikes, asking questions such as “Do you own a bible?” and “If we had an event like a bonfire or movie showing, what would it take to attract you?”

Bethany Wilday, a representative of the Temple Tech group explained that this event was a joint effort with the church. The poster boards and survey responses were given to church representatives.

“Their (the churches) focus right now is on campus college ministry outside of Intervarsity,” Wilday said. “The real point of this is to get a vibe of what students are thinking and how they feel – and to get a pulse for the campus and the hearts of the students here.”

While church groups hosted this event, religion was not the focus of the day. Students were encouraged to be open-minded and write about what they wanted to. All quotes written on the board were anonymous, unless the student chose to leave their name or initials.

“I like to think of this as more of an art piece than just like the Christian thing,” said student Zac Buddenberg. “Things we think about that are always in the back of our minds, its nice to have a place to express and talk about it.”