Mirror - Vol. 29, No. 21 - March 14, 2004

              Robyn Atkachunas/The Mirror
House arrest: During Monday's housing lottery, Joe King '05, Rob Williams '05, Kurt Heinold '05, Mike Barry '05 and Ed Hogan '05
discuss which townhouse they'd like to reside in for the upcoming school year.
Students pinched by housing options
BY STEVEN ANDREWS
Meagan Nestler '05 feels she
has been extremely unlucky with
housing at Fairfield University.
"Freshman year I was stuck in
a forced triple," she said. "Sopho-more
year I had one of the last picks
and got stuck in freshman housing,
this year I got stuck in Claver. Now
it looks like the best I can do for
senior year is live in Kostka/Claver
again."
Due to changes in the way the
housing lottery works this year,
Nestler's options were drastically
reduced.
"Originally I was going to live
at the beach, but I couldn't get it to
work financially," she said. "Since
all the seniors I knew already had
chosen where they were going to
live, I decided to apply with some
junior friends of mine."
Since Nestler was the lone
senior, the group of five had to use
a junior's number to apply for a
townhouse.
SEE "HOUSING" ON P. 4
RELATED STORY
Upperclassmen
have housing
lottery before
RAs are hired
Page 3
Four years of classes, exams, papers
and parties are about to end for the class of
2004. But now they face a new challenge
-finding a job.
Over the past several years the econ-omy,
and subsequently the job market, has
suffered greatly, making companies looking
for college hires few and far between. Luck-ily
for graduates, the job market is looking
up, and college hires are on the rise.
"The companies that were recruiting
here at the career fair had openings, which
wasn't always the case in past years," said
Michael Dalton, director of the Career Plan-ning.
"In other years there were a lot of
courtesy interviews, a lot of 'we'll let you
know if...' interviews. Now companies are
actually starting to hire again."
"If I had to rate the job market for the
Class of 2004, I'd give it a C+," Dalton
added. "Last year it was a C at best."
According to Jobweb.com, the job out-look
for the class of 2004 looks promising,
with statistics showing that companies will
hire 12.7 percent more college graduates
than last year. The majors that are most
often targeted for jobs, according to the
site, are accounting, engineering, business
administration, economics and finance.
"There's a perception - with some valid-ity
to it - that accounting and finance majors
have an easier time getting jobs," said Dalton.
"It stems from the fact that business oriented
careers do a lot of on-campus recruiting. Most
big companies, like General Electric, even
have entire college recruiting departments."
SEE "JOBS" ON P. 6
'Naut' party funds dry up; weeknight events on hold
BY MIKE THEILE
Thinking of going down to the
beach to party at the Naut? Well,
naut anymore.
A long-standing tradition at
Fairfield, the Naut is a party that
happens Monday through Thurs-day
night at the beach.
Each beach student is asked
to pay $40, which pays for all the
Naut parties. The student houses
that contribute to the fund are then
assigned a night to host the event.
The Naut has dried up because
of insufficient funds collected
from beach students, according to
Student Beach Residents Associa-tion
representatives.
"Not enough people have
given money for the Naut this
year," said SBRA President Matt
Coolidge '04, who is also one of
the Naut organizers. "Some people
did not want to pay, and there is not
much we can do about it."
In years past, the parties have
had success.
"We usually get more money
than expected from students, and
then we put that money towards
other events like the Mock Wed-ding,"
said Coolidge. "The beer
is not free and it's unfortunate
that there is nothing we can do. If
people don't give money, the Naut
can't happen."
The Naut still can come back
this April, but only if people decide
to pay, according to Coolidge.
One student placed blame on
students for not contributing and
also the event organizers for not
filling the Naut's coffers.
"I think it's ridiculous because
the Naut has been tradition at the
beach for years and our class has
screwed it up," said Matt Shaw '04.
"The blame lies with both the stu-dents,
who were too cheap to pay,
and the organizers of the Naut, who
weren't prepared enough to collect
the money from everyone."
SEE "STUDENTS" ON P. 6