2008 Woodie Awards
Phil Forum wasted on selfish freshmen
Sami Richards
Issue date: 4/25/08 Section: Opinion
The annual freshman Phil Forum, held the evening of Monday, April 21, was an experience through which I had to cringe my way through.
The forum is set up to create a dialogue between administrators, such as Phil Creighton, president of Pacific University, and the freshman students on campus. Creighton prefaced the evening with a request for exchanging information and insightful input from the selected freshman in the room.
These insights were little more than personal anecdotes. There were almost no regards for the university as a whole and the entire evening of discussion had the same old concerns: old resident buildings, tuition and the new residents halls, why freshman and sophomores are stuck on campus and out of Vandervelden and the poor quality of Aramark-provided food.
Aside from one male freshman representative attending the evening that expressed that he was not in attendance to talk about residence life or food services, everyone who spoke up about their personal concerns had 'me, myself and I' to throw out on the table.
The responses by Creighton and some of the other administrators were very patient and understanding of the freshman complaints, but even they seemed to express a point of loss with the redundant and self-involved comments.
The worst one-sided discussion involved student housing and food services. The student manager for Aramark was in attendance and did his best to help with responses to the freshman criticisms. While dragging out the complaint, after the Aramark student manager explained they were more than happy to take suggestions from anyone, a female student from Hawaii said, "I mean, Hawaiian students aren't going to take the initiative [to put a piece of paper into a box]."
"Whose university is this?" Creighton asked the room. A question you might hear a kindergarten teacher ask her students about the classroom when they begin to tamper with their supplies or start causing problems. And that was just it; ownership was missing from the discussion.
The forum is set up to create a dialogue between administrators, such as Phil Creighton, president of Pacific University, and the freshman students on campus. Creighton prefaced the evening with a request for exchanging information and insightful input from the selected freshman in the room.
These insights were little more than personal anecdotes. There were almost no regards for the university as a whole and the entire evening of discussion had the same old concerns: old resident buildings, tuition and the new residents halls, why freshman and sophomores are stuck on campus and out of Vandervelden and the poor quality of Aramark-provided food.
Aside from one male freshman representative attending the evening that expressed that he was not in attendance to talk about residence life or food services, everyone who spoke up about their personal concerns had 'me, myself and I' to throw out on the table.
The responses by Creighton and some of the other administrators were very patient and understanding of the freshman complaints, but even they seemed to express a point of loss with the redundant and self-involved comments.
The worst one-sided discussion involved student housing and food services. The student manager for Aramark was in attendance and did his best to help with responses to the freshman criticisms. While dragging out the complaint, after the Aramark student manager explained they were more than happy to take suggestions from anyone, a female student from Hawaii said, "I mean, Hawaiian students aren't going to take the initiative [to put a piece of paper into a box]."
"Whose university is this?" Creighton asked the room. A question you might hear a kindergarten teacher ask her students about the classroom when they begin to tamper with their supplies or start causing problems. And that was just it; ownership was missing from the discussion.
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