Kept in the dark

Student groups were not made aware of right to reserve block seats at games

Basically, no one knows much about the block seating rules at football games, as evidenced by today’s front page story.

Although last year’s Student Government Association worked with the Athletic Association to reserve those spaces as the seating turned general admission, the officers didn’t have any say in the application process or what followed.

Likewise, this year SGA members have no hand in it at all, even the athletics representative.

Fraternities worked with the Greek Life office to get seats, and sororities didn’t even consider applying.

So who knows what’s going on? We don’t.

This is what we know now:

Block seating exists, even though this year’s policy is first-come, first-served for student sections.

Block seating is available for all student groups, even though no announcements of any kind were made to allow them to apply.

And this is where we’re hung up.

Why wasn’t anyone told – student organizations and students alike? The groups didn’t have an opportunity to claim a spot, and students weren’t told that they couldn’t sit there. They grabbed seats before the game and then had to move.

And who decides where they sit? We’ve been told those are the “worst” student seats, but plenty of football fans have told us that those are the best because you can see the entire field.

And where’s the final straw? Fraternity members received their wristbands in advance. Now that student organizations know they can apply, how can the Athletic Association decide who gets a block and who doesn’t? Will it be based on overall GPA, club mission or popularity? There are some dangerous opportunities for discrimination there.

Do you limit it to first-come, first served block seats, thus further limiting students not in a group? Will students join groups or even create their own groups just to get good seats? This is going to the extreme, we know, but these are the possibilities you have to consider when it comes to 606 student organizations, masses of students and football.

As we’ve been reporting this week, some parts of the new system worked, and others didn’t. As far as we can tell, questions about block seating are only going to get worse. This is a kink that needs an iron, fast.

- Carolyn Crist for the editorial board