Mirror - Vol. 29, No. 09 - October 30, 2003

              The
October 30, 2003 - Vol. 29, Iss. 9 Fairfield University's Student Newspaper
Number crunching With $85 per student for an entire year,
FUSA gets creative with money
BY ZACK FINLEY
Tuition pays for the bulk of
your experience at Fair-field.
Room and board
pays for the other major part of
it. But the "General Fee" is some-thing
that many complain about,
but really never realize what it's
used for.
"I heard that it was used to
pay for things like the Health
Center and for computer lab
maintenance or something," said
Frank Hingley '05. "But what if I
only use my computer in my room
and never get sick? I kind of want
to know where the rest goes."
Leave that up to the members
of FUSA, who use part of that fee,
$85, to finance just about every-thing
from this weekend's perfor-mance
by Dave Chappelle to, you
guessed it, butt shorts.
While you were at home
soaking up the sun and dreading
those 8 a.m. classes, members of
FUSA were on campus research-ing
the best ways to show you a
good time once you arrived back
on campus: $260,400 worth of
ways.
That's the amount that FUSA
will spend financing the programs
it offers and financing the branch-es
that run them this year.
"We got together during the
summer and looked at the pro-grams
that were successful over
the years," said Jillian Grant '05,
vice president of programming
for FUSA. "I talked with Joni
Saunders, VP of Programming
last year, and we decided what
was best with the amount of
resources we have."
Dave Chappelle, who will
perform Saturday night, cost
FUSA $47,000. They have an al-lotted
$21,000 for major concerts
in the budget. The rest will be
funded by the ticket sales. FUSA
cannot make a profit due to the
size and location of the venue.
"A quarter of a million dol-lars
is a lot," said Kate Young
'06. "We have to get a bunch of
stuff for that... The campus isn't
that big."
"Taking the 3,000 or so
students that are undergrads here
and the $85 we get from them,"
said Kevin Neubauex '05, FUSA
president, "That's how we get the
$260,400."
Neubauer says that although
$85 may seem like a lot for stu-dents
to spend at first, the money
is going entirely for them to enjoy.
A "good percentage" of FUSA's
budget goes to programming, he
said.
"We are the Fairfield Uni-versity
Student Association," said
Sean Klock, a senator for the class
of 2004. "Our goal is the happi-ness
of the students."
But students have conflicting
views on the FUSA and how their
money is spent.
"I think some of those things
that they do are good, but some of
them are corny," said Stef Diter-lizzi
'05. "I understand that they
have to provide an alternative to
other things on the weekend, it
just seems like so many people
can't enjoy everything because
they have other plans."
Some students think that they
receive all the bang for their buck
that they could ask for.
SEE "ATTENDANCE" ON P. 6
Flatto, Hug face off in First Selectman debate
BY STEVEN ANDREWS
It did not take long for the
debate between Ken Flatto with
his running mate Denise Dougi-ello
and E. Penny Hug with her
running mate Stephen Elworthy
to turn to the topic of the beach.
The first question asked
to the current First Selectman
Flatto and candidate Hug by an
audience member pertained to the
issue of the ongoing problems the
town has had to deal with between
students and year-long beach resi-dents.
"Three years ago I initiated
meetings between FUSA, SBRA,
and Fairfield University officials
in an attempt to find solutions for
Steven Andrews/The Mirror
Taking issue: The candidates for first selectmen and their running
mates held a debate in the Oak Room last week. From left, Denise
Dougiello, Ken Flatto, Stephen Elworthy, and E. Penny Hug.
a reasonable social life which
would protect the living atmo-sphere
for year-long residents as
well," Flatto said at the debate
Oct. 23 in the Oak Room.
Hug agreed that the best
way to alleviate the problems
which occur at the beach is to
promote a stronger relationship
between the town residents and
students.
"We need to develop a
strong town-gown relationship
so that there is respect and com-munication
between both sides,"
Hug said.
Questions were also asked
about a review of the injunc-tion
that has been placed against
students at the beach, disal-lowing
large gatherings. Both
candidates admitted it would be
a difficult action to remove the
injunction.
"Since the injunction was
forced by the court, it is some-thing
the first selectman could
not remove, but I would look
into the matter of reviewing it,"
Hug said.
SEE "ELECTION" ON P. 4
Fairfield
diversity still
lacking,
survey says
BY EILEEN ARNOLD
According to The Princeton
Review, the Fairfield University
student body is the tenth most
homogenous in the nation.
That's nothing compared to the
faculty, however, which is even less
diverse than the student body.
Despite promises of equal op-portunity
employment, the faculty
is still overwhelmingly white.
"We haven't been very suc-cessful
in attracting a diverse
faculty," said Academic Vice
President Orin Grossman.
The university office of
management information reports
the full time faculty at 43 percent
female and 47 percent male.
There are
five African-
American profes-sors
at Fairfield
now: Susan
Tomlinson and
Ben Halm in the
English depart-ment,
Walter
Petry and Harold
Forsythe in the History department
and Olivia Harriott in Biology.
Forsythe will not be returning
to Fairfield next year.
Forsythe said Fairfield is, "not
enough of a.challenge in some ways
and too much of a challenge in other
ways." He did not receive tenure af-ter
six years and is now looking for
schools with doctoral programs.
Although Forsythe said, "the
faculty is welcoming," and "black
studies is very well supported by
the administration," he was trained
to work with graduate students and
would like to pursue this.
"Even though this is better
than some of the places I've been,
Fairfield doesn't fit me. I'm ur-ban,"
Forsythe said.
The administration is already
searching for a replacement for
Forsythe, but attracting a minor-ity
candidate to Fairfield for this
faculty job could be difficult.
"It [Fairfield] is a campus
that is overwhelmingly white,
very parochial and doesn't have
broad interests," said Walter Petry,
assistant professor in the history
department and temporary director
of the Black Studies Program.
SEE "SEARCH" ON P. 4
PETRY