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TechNews | Tuesday, janua1y26th, 2016

Let's kill cynicism before it kills this campus

Soren Spicknall
TECHN EWS WRITER

For the last several years, Illinois
Tech has consistently ranked near the top of The
Princeton Review’s annual list of “Least Happy
Schools”. While the metrics used to make such
rankings are always inherently dubious, there
is some merit to that dishonorable title. Despite
the consistently stellar outcomes of an IIT
education and the university’s ability to attract
more and more new undergraduates each year,
students seem to become disenchanted at an
alarming pace once they start their studies
here. Some among the school’s faculty have
remarked that such a poor happiness ranking
likely has to do with the rigor of classes and the
general academic focus of the institution, but
that perspective seems to ignore the fact that
pride can overcome academic challenge, as if
evidenced by many other largely technological
universities across the nation which score
well on student life metrics, such as MIT and
Carnegie Mellon University And besides, hard
work alone does not cause a negative campus
atmosphere; there is much more to it than the
academic side of the story

Before even entering IIT as a
freshman, I had already come across some
degree of negativity from current students.
During Scholarship Weekend that February,
Ca.mras Scholars hosting visiting Illinois Tech
applicants had occasionally let slip little bits of
intriguingly troubling information about the
school’s staff, various student organizations,
and other entities on campus that could be
blamed for some negative aspect of their life.
During my freshman year, I was continually
bombarded with comments from older
students, speaking with authority, claiming
that some office or another was corrupt, that
Finance Board was incompetent, that Sodexo
was an actively malicious organization, and so
on. Given that it was my first year, I didn’t yet
have the resources to form my own opinions,
and if it hadn’t have been for a few more
positiveethinking individuals in my life, I
would never have bothered to get involved in
campus life and find out the truth: very little
of the jaded assumptions of our student body
have any basis in reality

In the Fall semester of 2015, the
Student Government Association (SGA) held
a wellepublicized Town Hall meeting on the
topic of dining feedback and improvements.
During the course of the event, perhaps 50
students came through, speakng directly to a
panel composed of IIT Dining Services staff,
university administration involved in meal
plan formulation, and Ricky Stevens, who was
then the head of the studenteled Food Advisory
Board (FAB). Throughout the event, all those
involved stressed student participation in the
latter organization as a way to have their input
heard on a regular basis. Food Advisory Board
was mentioned at least ten times during the
Town Hall, but when all was said and done, I
walked into to the next FAB meeting that week
representing HT’s Residence Hall Association,
as I usually do, to find no new faces in the
room. The students who had participated
in the Dining Town Hall had taken the
opportunity to vent their frustrations at Dining
staff, but had decided not to follow up and
join the productive conversation that is had
within FAB. This phenomenon is common on
this campus, when even our most outspoken
voices deny themselves the chance to make
real change by dismissing available methods
of real, impactful advising. This is generally
followed by vocal pessimism passed on to
others, perpetuating the cycle of cynicism.

When the new fire alarm policy
was put in place for residential buildings on
campus last Fall, the initial email sent out on
the topic angered the vast majority of residents
and was cause for a great amount of discussion
over the following week and beyond. I heard
over and over again that Residence and Greek
Life (RGL) and Dean of Students Katie Stetz

had “gone rogue" and that students had no
power to make their voice heard or to change
the decision. During that same time, Dea.n
Stetz made appointments available for any
student wishing to offer input on the policy,
and barely two weeks after the announcement,
the Residence Hall Association (RHA) made
feedback about it the topic of a Hall Council
Leadership meeting, which includes its
executive board (all students) and executive
liaisons, who represent each section of the
residence halls. Speaking with Nikki Dunham
from RGL, they gained clarification about
the grounds for a fine, and agreed to prepare
an email sent from RHA to each resident
explaining some of the most pressing questions
about the policy In addition, Dunham stressed
that the policy was fluid and was intended to
be changed based on student feedback, a point
stressed in RHA’s explanation email as well.
When many students were decrying the policy
as yet another signthat HT’s administrationhad
no care for its students, HT’s administration
was working hard to give its students as much
input and access as possible.

Whenl first became involvedina few
student organizations on campus, I often heard
complaints about how the Student Activities
Fund (SAF) was distributed. Common threads
of conversation involved Union Board (UB)’s
perennially large allocation, comments about
how it used to be much easier to get money
from OCL before the advent of the current
system (a point I can’t comment on with any
expertise, since I’ve only been involved in
recent years), and complaints about inadequate
funding for new or small organizations. To the
first point, students don’t seem to realize that
a huge amount of UB’s funding goes directly
to other organizations’ events, since every Boga
hosted event is partnered with and funded by
UB. Additionally, UB is one of the largest and
most active student orgs on campus, and has
a long history of putting on impactful, well,
planned events. It’s natural that they receive a
large amount of funding, since they’ve proven
that they are capable of using it efficiently To
the second point, it should be noted that SAF
proposals exist because Finance Board is made
up of a small group of students, run through
SGA,that manages funding for all 220 registered
student organizations at IIT, and their work is
rather impressive with that in mind. If such a
system didn’t exist, it would be up to the direct
discretion of OCL, not students, to determine
what proposals merit funding. Finally, our
Student Activities Fund is incredible in size for
a university with such a small undergraduate
population, and the financial freedom given to
student organizations here is almost without
peer. WHT’s executive board, then all new,
proposed for $50,000 to fund Bill Nye’s visit
at the beginning of this academic year, and
not only was that funding granted, but OCL
took on much of the contract negotiation and
logistics for them. I am currently part of a
small group of students working to revive the
Illinois Tech Model Railroad, and OCL staff
obtained permission for us to enter the empty
Main Building and retrieve equipment that
belonged to the club historically, something
they had no obligation to do, especially for
a group that wasn’t yet even reactivated as a
student organization. Both of these groups
were unproven in the eyes of OCL or Finance
Board, but we were granted significant
funding or powers based on the quality of our
proposals.

Of course, while trying to avoid
cynicism, it’s also important to keep idealism
in check as well. I am fully aware that there
are large issues facing this school, both in
campus life and in the academic realm. One
of my organizations had its leaders chosen
for it at one point by OCL, and then the next
year by an SGA committee, both of which
were unpopular among members and were
destabilizing to the organization in the short
term. And no matter what RHA advises, there

are just some building upgrades that won’t
be done, especially in residential complexes
with limited lifespan. President Cra.mb has
said there are approximately eight years left
for MSV in its current form. No matter what
goes on in a Food Advisory Board meeting,
Sodexo is still a private company, and will have
to make a profit. One of the most important
points to make is that, in order for all of the
school’s input systems to work properly, they
must be properly publicized and regulated.
SGA has a responsibility to advertise open
Senate seats and put as much information out
as possible about our elections, and at times
that responsibility hasn’t been fulfilled. Many
other organizations and ofiices face similar
visibility and policy issues. In addition to
enthusiastically joining many organizations,
I’ve also worked to improve them and combat
problems that arise. I’ve rewritten two student
organization constitutions to make sure
they comply to their own rules, I’ve become
unintentionally privy to intereofiice drama at
times when searching for funding information
for organizations, and I’ve even recently
submitted a Judicial Board petition in the
hopes of ruling certain SGA actions illegal.

I don’t see Illinois Tech as some
perfect environment, but I do see in the
school plenty of opportunity for input and
change. For an institution with barely 3,000
undergraduates, the variety of our food service
is frankly amazing. IIT Dining staff manage
seven separate locations, providing options
for a huge variety of religious, healtherelated,
and voluntary dietary restrictions. Quality
and customer service have both improved
as a result of input from the Food Advisory
Board, organized by students. That direct
decisionemaking is a hallmark of many of our
professional ofiices: it’s downright easy to make
an appointment with most of our academic
Deans, department heads, and campus life
staff members. On the subject of student
organizations, joining SGA or attending its
meetings is a great way to have control over
approval of each new organization, as well as
funding for each organization. Additionally,
SGA has a measurable impact on professional
ofiices, organizing Town Hall meetings and
representing the students to academic and
administrative staff members.

The problem with IIT isn’t Dea.n
Stetz, Sodexo, Finance Board, or whatever
else you were told your first few years here
and perhaps perpetuated to the students who
arrived here after you. The problem is our
cycle of cynicism, wherein we constantly deny
ourselves opportunities to create change based
on the supposed fact that we’re up against
a big, welleoiled machine designed to suck
money and make students unhappy The thing
is, in the end we’re in control of that machine,
and it won’t work properly unless more of us
take up the reins and take steps toward the
things we want to see implemented. When
only six percent of students vote for SGA’s
executive board, we can’t reasonably expect
them to represent us accurately When only
half of all residence hall floors have an active
Floor Representative, we won’t see our views
communicated to RGL. When we dismiss
certain staff members based on assumptions,
we will never learn how dedicated, engaged,
and hardworking the members of OCL,
the Office of Student Affairs, HT Dining,
our colleges, and more really are. Some of
the burden lies with the institutions of this
university, but most of it lies with us in the end.
If we sit here, jaded, and declare that Illinois
Tech’s interests aren’t with its students, those
interests never will be. But if we speak up,
join organizations, and find the channels that
already exist to communicate our concerns, we
can build a positive campus from here. It’s up
to us to change the narrative, and kill cynicism
before it kills this campus.

Qmagxiwyamnme

 

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