Boundaries
Dear Kent,
As with other faculty and students, I am not surprised to learn that the Princeton Review ranked SU as the top party school in the US. The students I TA say they party most nights - Two for Tuesdays, Wednesday Flip Night, Thirsty Thursdays, and Friday night happy hour and then it's the weekend! And the ones in my summer class thought our ranking was awesome and your email hilarious. They say their best friends are Chuck, Maggie, Harry, Lucy, and DJ - yep, all Marshall Street bars. The frat/bro-culture encouraged here certainly participates in the party scene--not to mention the sexual assaults that often occur at frat parties, at bars, and in the dorms. It is this hyper-masculinized culture that necessitates the services and resources of a place like the Advocacy Center. But, yes, as a top entrepreneurial school, we recognize your desire to "centralize" resources even if that means cutting the programs that effectively reach students. (Also, nice touch on "centralizing" the AC to the health center....placing "help" on frat row is not problematic at all.) Also, if you care so much about SU's impression on the "world" (seriously, because people in Gaza and Iraq give a shit about that right now, or ever), maybe you can listen when over 10,000 people sign a petition rejecting your closure of the AC and we are covered on national news.
In fact, as you've "toured" Syracuse, visited with SU Ambulance, and explored our raucous Mayfest activities, you haven't mentioned concern over the masculinized party culture here. Because if you were able to send out an email to the entire campus about riding in the ambulance *on a weekend* and not mention the intoxicated students it regularly picks up, then you knew about the problem and were just ignoring it. It seems that only when an outside organization points out Syracuse's obvious reputation do you believe it's worth investigating. What you propose--more programming by RAs, more PR work by students and alums, and more "boundaries," simply does not get at the underlying sense of entitlement and privilege that foster Syracuse's party-culture.
Ultimately, Kent, those entitled and privileged students are laughing at your e-mail. And for those of us aware of Syracuse's party culture--which is INEXTRICABLE with its obsession with sports (and yes, the Dome sells beer)--we recognize that the "balancing act" you detail in your quest for creating "boundaries" is a patronizing effort that fails to address the real underlying issues with the university. The REAL issues are the university's capitalist, masculinist, racist, and sexist structures that enable this bro-party culture. And you writing with some outdated in loco parentis 1950s bullshit isn't going to change a thing. If you want to truly see the campus as a place for "educational excellence" and show your "commitment to enhancing it," you might want to start with spending less on sports, not allowing fraternities, and focusing money on TEACHING rather than administration. Since that is, you know, the whole point of college.
Cerina, Phd Student
WGS TA