Nerds of every fandom now have a place to call home on the Missouri Southern campus. Now entering its second official semester as a campus club, the Nerd Culture Club offers its members the chance to be their nerdy selves in a non-judgemental environment while also giving them the chance to share some of their more avid interests with others who may appreciate them.

“In reality, our main goal is basically to provide some way of showing people … that there’s nothing wrong with being yourself,” said Matt Mengel, engineering major and club member. “Don’t worry about college life and trying to grow up, you can still have fun.”

Club members meet  twice a week to discuss any plans they have for the club, to organize campus club events, or to even plan off-campus get-togethers like role-playing games or attending conventions.

“During the meetings, we usually discuss any plans we have for things that we’re going to do for the club or outside the club,” said Mengel. “We’ll also usually … turn on the computer and let them [the members] show something. So one might show Poke-Mon, an episode of it, or one might show Marvel Avengers, or something like that. It’s something they’ve seen before that they really like and want the others to be able to know about.”

During the first semester, the club limited its campus-wide events in order to focus more on establishing club rules and building its membership, but now that the club has entered its second semester, it plans to host more events aimed at garnering more recognition.

“We’re going to do a few more things that are getting the name out and let people actually have fun and do stuff on campus,” said Mengel.

According to Mengel, the Nerd Culture Club originally formed as an offshoot from the MSSU Asian Club after it became apparent that some of its members had only joined in order to explore interests in anime.

Once the Nerd Club broke away, it expanded its focus to include other nerdy fandoms as well and was structurally modeled after Pittsburg State University’s Anime Club, which they still communicate with on occasion.

“We still talk to them and try to plan things [with them],” said Mengel, “but it usually doesn’t work very well because of the different things we go to.”

For more information regarding the Nerd Culture Club, contact Mengel at (417) 214-9133.