WISCONSIN DELLS, WI – A youth group that has remained relevant to high school students in the United States for over 70 years must continue to come up with ways to keep its message fresh. The Career and Community Leaders of America has absorbed this lesson very well. Founded in 1945, this nonprofit organization has grown to 150,000 members in every state plus Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands by wrapping its core message of personal responsibility in an exciting package that appeals to young sensibilities.

This was very much in evidence this April, when the CCLA mixed serious life learning lessons with youth-oriented fun activities at its three-day Wisconsin conference, which was held at the at the Kalahari Resort, home of a 125,000 sq. ft. (11,600 m2) indoor water park and a 110,000 sq. ft. (10,000 m2) indoor theme park. Aside from these attractions, the conference also reached out to young attendees by turning its meeting hall into a teen club every evening with help from a collection of fixtures from CHAUVET Professional.

Lighting designer Glenn Ottenbacher of AGS Event Productions used six Rogue R2 Wash RGBW LED washes, six Legend 230SR Beams and two Hurricane foggers to transform the convention center room into a teen-oriented club. Ottenbacher positioned two of the Rogue fixtures on upstage stands and flew the other four on FOH truss.

“The massive output and bold colors of the washes gave us a lot of good club looks when the evening came,” said the LD. “We also has a lot of fun creating pixel looks with the fixture’s individual zones of control. It was great for the kind of eye candy that the kids loved.”

Ottenbacher also placed two of the Legend 230SR Beams on upstage stands and flew four plus the Hurricane foggers on the same overhead truss as the Rogue units. From this position, the bright Legend beams could sweep the dance floor with intense colors and gobo patterns to enhance the club-like atmosphere.

Working with Steve Rader of Wille Fun Entertainment. Aaron Zimmermann of Proline Entertainment, Ottenbacher and his assistant Shelli Grantham received favorable comments every evening for creating a teen club-like atmosphere at the conference. However, in keeping with the CCLA’s philosophy of mixing youthful merriment with serious messaging, their lighting rig also had to set an appropriately professional tone for educational sessions when the room reverted back to a meeting area.

“The Rogues were incredibly versatile,” he said. “They have a very wide (12°-49°) zoom range, so we could cover a large area on the dancefloor in the evening and then have smaller stage washes for speakers the next day.  We knew we need versatility from our rig, and that’s exactly what we got!  We were able to do a lot of different things with a relatively small and very affordable rig.”