Drake will perform at Eastern as part of his “Away from Home” tour through the University Board, but Eastern is not the only school that has a student-run organization bringing talent to campus.

Southern Illinois University, Illinois State University and Western Illinois University have student groups that poll the campus and then contact acts based off the results.

WIU has an organization called the University Union Board, a student-run board that is made up of eight committees. One of these committees is a concert committee run by students.

The University Union Board at WIU brought the pop/rock band White Tie Affair in the fall and will bring country artist Gloriana this semester.

Diane Cumbie, assistant director of student activities and senior adviser to the WIU University Union Board,, said the board usually has acts of different genres each semester, including rap, alternative rock and country among a number of others.

“The committee here chooses the group and the genre goes on a rotating basis,” Cumbie said.

She said the board also deals with costs such as artists fees, riders, hotel costs and venue costs.

ISU will bring rap artist Snoop Dogg to campus this semester through the campus’s University Program Board.

SIU is still in the process of booking acts. Don Castle, head of the student programming council at SIU, said they have not booked a show yet, but students are looking at an end of the year show with the $20,000 they have available.

“We have not done a show for the last couple of years,” Castle said.

In the past, rappers Yung Joc and Juelz Santana, have performed at SIU.

One of the reasons for this could be that the SIU Arena, which can seat about 9,000 audience members, was under renovation this past year.

The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign has an organization on campus called Star Course.

Last semester, reggae musician Matisyahu, alternative rock band The Academy Is and instrumentalist Andrew Bird came to campus through Star Course.

Bill Bodell, who deals with publicity and tickets for Star Course, said he enjoyed going to the Andrew Bird show because he is a great musician.

“It’s not like anything else,” Bodell said. “He plays every instrument you can think of while whistling along.”

Another venue at the University of Illinois is the Foellinger Auditorium. Phil Strang, facility manager, said a lot of other performances for the University of Illinois are organized by separate registered student organizations and include fashion shows, variety shows, A cappella music shows and a variety of others.

Heather Holm can be reached at 581-7942 or haholm@eiu.edu.