Looking at underclassman participation in events and activities outside of Fairfield University’s campus, I believe that it is rather difficult for these earlier years to get involved than it is for upperclassmen to do the same. I say this for the reason that there are certain factors that inhibit underclassmen students from involving themselves in these off-campus occurrences.
One factor that I would like to bring up is the reliance on the Stag Bus as the primary means of transportation. Now, I do not hate the Stag Bus, but as an underclassman, I strongly dislike that it is the only reliable way to get from point A to point B. This overreliance is due, in part, to the fact that underclassmen are not permitted to keep their vehicles with them on campus until the beginning of their junior year. The only exceptions are nursing students who need cars and other forms of transportation for clinicals or for students who have certain accommodations.
Most underclassmen are forced to use the Stag Bus as their way of getting to locations like downtown Fairfield, the train station, supermarkets and more. Sophomore Iris Rivera stated “the Transloc app doesn’t always show the current location of the bus and so it’s hard to accurately plan when to go back on without risking missing the bus and having to wait one hour for the bus to loop again.” She continued to say, “the amount of time [the] bus takes to run its entire route depends on the amount of students riding at a given time. This [number] varies depending on the time of day, as a route running at 5 p.m. carries significantly more students than one at 10 p.m.” I personally think that going on the Stag Bus, for the first time in particular, is very stressful and to have these additional problems and inconveniences to worry about, it really makes the experience difficult and unenjoyable.
Another factor that underclassmen students encounter is the fact that they most likely do not know what activities are going on outside of the university. When it comes to on-campus affairs, I believe that most students have access to information on these events and how to participate.
When it comes to activities that happen outside of the university, there is little to no information given as to how to involve yourself. I know that there are definitely some events that you can throw yourself into. In my experience, I was able to go with some of my Langguth classmates to New York City. This trip came about, however, only because I am a part of the creative life track within the Residential College, thus granting me the opportunity. This example furthers my point that in order to involve yourself as an underclassman in some of these off-campus events, you must be a part of a club or group that allows you to participate in such activities. This can be limiting to some underclassmen who are not involved in many clubs or organizations and thus not afforded these luxuries like other students, such as myself.
The final factor I wish to touch on is Engagement Fairfield’s newsletter entitled “#TheWeekender.” This newsletter functions as a way to give students updates on what exactly they could do on a particular weekend off-campus. My reasoning as to why this is a factor is simply because it is advertised poorly to the general student population and is way too long for the average person to read. I personally had never come across, nor read, the newsletter prior to Oliver Merriam ‘27 bringing it to my attention. I believe that this newsletter really could serve as a way to notify students of upcoming events off-campus if it were promoted more and condensed certain sections to make the report more appealing to the average student.
Overall, I believe that Fairfield University does attempt to make off-campus life and events accessible to all students. Unfortunately, there are more barriers for underclassmen in comparison to other types of students.
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