Fairfield University has a serious problem when it comes to priorities, and the response to Nemo is the perfect example of this claim.
Let’s get one thing straight – the school did a decent job feeding us, and they were nice enough to cancel a few classes when absolutely necessary.
However, my own observations leave me no other choice than to say the following: Money comes before student safety for Fairfield administration.
Let me take you through part of my storm experience.
On the morning of Sunday, Feb. 10, I was walking back from the BCC to my townhouse on the 13 block. Now, I’m a realistic person, and wasn’t expecting clear sidewalks the day after the conclusion of the worst blizzard to hit Connecticut in 30 years.
However, I was expecting to at least see a definitive effort on the part of the school, an effort that stretched beyond the most basic tasks expected of them.
What I saw was the opposite. As I walked up Lynch Rd., a look to my left showed two driven snow blowers plowing through Alumni Field.
Looking behind me, I saw a bulldozer backing up and coming straight toward me, and realized I should probably get on the sidewalk … oh wait, they hadn’t even started plowing the sidewalks yet. So in the end, I had to run up Lynch Rd. to avoid the possibility of being mowed down by a bulldozer whose driver may have not seen me.
Now what’s more important – making sure students don’t have to walk on slippery roads congested by vehicles, or making sure athletic practices and games are on schedule? As for the latter suggestion, I really can’t think of why else they would be plowing the field that soon.
Talk to an administrator on this point, and they will probably divert the conversation to praises of how well the school did to make sure students got fed and stayed informed.
But I think this fits just as well into my argument. Of course the school is going to continue feeding us. If they didn’t, parents would hear about it, and the possibility of enrolling younger siblings or donating post-graduation goes down significantly. In the end, it’s all about appearance, which brings in the money.
The same goes for keeping athletics on schedule. As long as we do the bare minimum to keep students safe, like plowing roadways and cancelling Monday classes, we can leave the sidewalks for a day or two to make sure so-and-so teams can have practice. It’s already been made quite apparent than athletics supersedes academics, but I didn’t think it was enough of a profitable business to take priority over student safety.
So for the next storm, Fairfield, let’s delay practice for a few days, and try a little harder to make sure I don’t have to run from any bulldozers.
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