To the Editor,

 

The April 8 article about Mendel Doug is some of the best literature I have ever read. I have heard many rumors about Doug’s past and I am glad to have learned the truth. Keep up the good work.

-Russell Miller

Class of 2013

 

Editor’s note: The following is a letter originally submitted to Rev. John Stack, O.S.A, Vice President of Student Life, following his NovaFest announcement e-mail.

Dear Rev. Stack,

I’m a senior student who has celebrated NovaFest each year that I’ve been enrolled at Villanova. 

After reading this announcement, I am once again disappointed with the way that  the Villanova administration is handling a problem that arises at the University. 

While I understand the actions that the University is taking this year with regards to NovaFest and, in particular, “WestFest,” I find it disingenuous and almost laughable for the University to claim that it didn’t sanction or approve the event that took place on West Campus each year.

Each year, Villanova University public safety officers stand at the entrance to West Campus, ride around West Campus on bicycles and drive around West Campus in University vehicles during WestFest. While these officers do nothing to discourage the drinking taking place on West Campus, I had two of my roommates be told they couldn’t enter West Campus last year because it was “too full.” This is in addition to the fact that students aren’t allowed to drive their own vehicles into West Campus after 11 a.m., even though we pay for parking permits and hang tags. 

If the University doesn’t sanction the event on West, then how can these public safety officers choose to disallow someone to enter their apartment after work rather than disallow hundreds of underage students from drinking on West Campus?

So, while the University has never issued a statement saying, “Villanova endorses underage drinking on West Campus,” the actions of the University and its employees have very clearly spoken that they do. It is understandable that in a college environment there will be cases of drinking, even underage, and I think I speak for most when I say that I have no problem with allowing one day of excess a year. 

However, for the University to allow this to happen and then make an attempt to avoid the responsibility and consequences of their choices speaks loudly of the character of those in charge. 

At a Catholic university which preaches the values that come with its faith, even going so far as to require an ethics course of its students, it seems especially egregious to squirm around the truth in the way that this statement has.

Over the four years that I’ve been a student here many changes have been made that seemed contradictory to what the students want, from the changing of dining options to a mainly organic menu, to the atrocity that is the basketball ticket system, where students are turned away from games while adults sit in the “student section,” to the parking situation in which students who pay for Main Lot passes are forced to park on South Campus because over 100 parking spaces are reserved for campus tours each day.  

Throughout it all, we have been given no explanations, no real voice in the matter other than through SGA elections which are nothing more than glorified popularity contests. 

This latest announcement to cancel NovaFest comes as no surprise, even though it has perhaps the best rationale of all the decisions that I’ve listed. 

But please, if the University chooses to continue making decisions contrary to the desires of its student body that pays an extraordinarily high tuition, at least have the decency to take responsibility for these decisions. 

Help the student body feel at least somewhat trustful in its administration, while at the same time setting an example of how to practice the Augustinian values that we are taught every day.

-Steve Homola

 Class of 2010