Overalls – What are they, and how and when to use them?

At most Swedish universities there is a tradition of having a section specific overall in varying colours and stripes. This is then used at parties and events when you have pimped it out with your name on the right leg and then you collect patches on the left leg. Patches can be bought and obtained for different reasons, they might be from parties you attend, you can have patches from the area you live in and organizations you involve yourself in. It’s a lot of fun to see everyone else’s overall and feel like you are a part of the student spirit. There are events that sometimes have the word “Kravall” in the title, which means overall required, at those events you really can shine with your pimped-out overall if you choose to get one.

Obtaining section-specific overalls is only possible for an exchange student if you are staying at least one year, you then contact the section of which you belong and ask to buy one. In other cases, ESN has overalls for exchange students that we sell at cost. The ESN overalls are dark blue and should have yellow stripes put on the legs, these are very popular each semester among the incoming students and generally the cheapest of all sections.

But, before you start putting anything on your overall there is a big event you will want to attend first, The Overall Inauguration. This is yet another tradition that you don’t want to miss, before the overall can ever be used, you need to get it really dirty. This is done through an inauguration event where you will perform different activities such as food and colour wars and crawling through mud among other things. It’s all built as competitions where you get divided into groups and compete in different activities. This event is usually the one that most people will look back on as the most fun event of their stay in Linköping.

Student dinners

Student organizations at the university host different kinds of dinners for their members during throughout the year. These dinners are in Swedish referred to as “Sittningar” which can be roughly translated as “Sittings”. Sittningar comes in many different styles but can generally be categorized into two main categories, Fin-sittning and Ful-sittning (Formal Sitting and Ugly sitting). Like Ugly wine, the ugly in the name here does not refer to its looks, but rather it is not quite as refined as a formal sitting.

The Formal Sittings have more guidelines to them. For example, they can generally be considered black tie events and a common location is Kårhuset Kollektivet although other locations are possible. Traditionally Formal Sittings is a three-course meal, Appetizer, Entree, and Dessert. Commonly the meals are served with white or red wine or Cider, an alcohol-free option should always be available as well. Different organizations in the school have different customs at Formal sittings, an example of this is the Economics and Industrial management sections which sing the Swedish Royal Anthem before getting seated.

The ugly sittings come in many different forms and shapes ranging from Toga sittings to Theme sittings where you dress up in a pre-set theme such as. Locations for these sittings can range from outdoors to any indoor location large enough to hold the intended crowd. The dress code follows the theme of the sitting. The kind of food served can come in various forms, however, it generally only comes as a single course. Drinks can also vary greatly but there should almost always be a non-alcoholic option available.

Common for all sittings is that they tend to have Toast Master and a theme. The Toast Masters, commonly referred to as TM, can be considered the conductors of the sitting. They usually come as a pair, often one man and one woman, and they keep the pace of the evening on track and call out and take the lead when songs have been wished. If your table wants to wish for a song you need to get the attention of the TM’s, which is achieved by answering the evening’s “theme”. The Theme is announced during the start of the sitting by the TMs and usually is the beginning of a statement. e.x. “Tonight I want to….”. It can also come in the form of a statement e.x. “I want to do this at KK:”

Parties

Some student organizations on campus exist with the only, or main, goal to create amazing parties for the students at the university. These organizations are usually, but not always, tied to a student section, for example, the Teacher’s section or Human Resources section. These parties are commonly hosted on Thursday, Friday, or Saturday and are generally advertised on Facebook and physically at the school.

The parties are commonly hosted at either Kårhuset Kårallen, usually only called Kårallen, or Kårhuset Kollektivet, usually referred to as KK. If you wish to attend these parties you need to obtain a ticket and the place and time of sale are usually announced on the event’s Facebook page. The price for these tickets varies but generally lands around 100 SEK ≈ 10 EUR. 

Like the Student dinners, Parties come in different forms, Themed parties, Kravall, or un-themed. The themed parties come in basically any form, from toga to pirate parties and so on. The one might be good to know more about and you can read a quick introduction to this topic under the Overalls Section.

Safe corps houses

The collective, Kårallen, Ryds Herrgård, Trappan, Örat and Kårhusett are Kårservice’s six clubhouses at Linköping University owned by the three clubs, Consensus, LinTek, and StuFF. Kårservice is responsible for operation and safety in the clubhouses. Corps service works closely with the corps and the students and together we help create the conditions for student life to be as good and safe as possible for everyone. Kårhusen has zero tolerance towards abusive treatment, harassment, sexual harassment, and discrimination.

During all events with us, Kårservice and our staff work to ensure that all visitors have fun and feel good in the kår houses right up until Stad i Ljus.

Should a situation that feels unsafe arise, there is a day manager/serving manager on site who you can contact directly. They have sweaters or shirts that show who they are. You can contact the bars to be referred to the person responsible for the evening. During nightclub operations, there are guards on site for your safety who are happy to help in all situations.

If you do not want or have the opportunity to contact the person in charge directly, you can fill in Kårhusen’s security form . If you want, we will contact you and help you further to get the help and support you need. We are also grateful for your input if something feels unsafe in general so we can work to make it safer. Kårhusen and Kårna collaborate with Student Health at LiU. If you as a student feel that you need someone to talk to, they can be of great help! You can find information about Student Health here .

Knowledge and guidelines

Guidelines

At our clubhouses we follow the Swedish alcohol law , which means that you must not get too drunk, bring your own alcohol into our clubhouses and not behave in a disruptive manner. 

All clubhouses comply with the alcohol law and apply responsible alcohol serving at every event. Water stations are always available, use them! Read more about the alcohol law here!

Unsafe behavior

If someone causes an event that endangers the safety of someone, one or more of the following measures are taken:

• Rejected for the evening by the person in charge and/or guard

  • This means that you are not welcome for the rest of the evening, but are welcome on other evenings.

• Yellow card

  • This means that you will receive a physical card in the hand of the person in charge/guard. You will be rejected for the evening and future evenings at all clubhouses until you have contacted the responsible Operations Manager at the relevant clubhouse. When contacting the Operations Manager, a meeting is booked for further information.

• Police report

More information about porting can be found HERE

Policy for the student reception 

In order to ensure good quality and further development of the reception activities, the student unions have chosen to draw up a joint policy for how the reception activities should be carried out. You can find it here .