Mirror - Vol. 15, No. 02 - September 20, 1990

              The
FairfieldMRRORV Volume 15, No. 2 Thursday, September 20, 1990 The Image Of Fairfield
New Law Cracks
Down On
Campus Drinking
AnnMarie Puckhaber
Editor-in-Chief
Effective October 1, a new
law will require Fairfield and other
colleges across the nation to take
a more active role ii* minimizing
the use of drugs and alcohol con-sumption
on campus.
The Drug Free Schools and
Communities Act was proposed
by President Bush in September
of 1989 and passed by Congress
last December.
"What we must do is imple-ment
programs to insure that drug
abuse is minimized and illegal
consumption of alcohol is mini-mized,"
said William P. Schimpf,
vice president of Student Serv-ices.
If Fairfield is found in vio-lation
of the law's requirements,
all federal funding will be taken
away, Schimpf said. Guaranteed
student loans, work study, and
federal grants are among the funds
that could be lost. The biggest
single impact would be on finan-cial
aid, Schimpf said.
"We are basically in com-pliance,"
Schimpf said. Fairfield
has on-going drug and alcohol
programs already, he said.
However, Schimpf said, no
one knows for certain how the
new set of regulations will be
interpreted. The University is
required to prove that the regula-tions
are consistently applied and
there is the possibility that that the
government will look at drinking
at the townhouses and the beach
as inconsistent enforcement, he
said.
"I think what we're doing is
fine," Schimpf said.
The University is required
to provide every student with in-formation
concerning the law, the
University's policy, and the
health hazards related to drugs
and alcohol. Schimpf said this
will be done the beginning of
October.
However, Schimpfdoes not
see the law as an answer to the
drinking problem. "It's a stupid
approach to the problem and will
not work," Schimpf said. The
law requires colleges to have the
programs but does not require
that they be effective, he said.
"All you have to do is look
at very recent history to show
you can not control alcohol by
prohibiting it," Schimpf said.
"Our students arrive here
season drinkers," Schimpf said.
"They establish drinking habits
before they get here."
A national study showed
that 90% of the middle and up-per-
class communities are drink-ing
two times a week in their
senior year in high school,
Schimpf said. "Fairfield is very
typical of this issue," he said.
The University is required
to review its program biannually
and submit a report to the De-partment
of Education, but it is
unknown whether or not the cam-pus
will be inspected by a gov-ernment
official, Schimpf said.
The law has been an unex-pected
additional expense to the
University, according to Schimpf.
The University has to have the
information for the students
printed and mailed to continuing
education and graduate students.
"No money has been added
to the budget for," Schimpf said.
"But in the future we'll be pre-pared
for it."
Stepsis Cancels Third
Reading Day
Christina Hennessy
News Editor
After two years of an ex-perimentational
run, the third read-ing
day has been cut from the 1991
spring semester, following a deci-sion
made late this summer by Dr.
Robert Stepsis, Academic Vice
President.
"The third reading day has
always been an experiment initi-tated
at the request of the FUSA
leadership at the time it was in-stalled,
" said Stepsis.
Mark Dietz, FUSA's for-mer
Director ofAcademics pushed
for the addition of the extra read-ing
day two years ago because of
strong student and administration
support.
"At the time FUSA was
trying to get the third reading day
on the calendar, 90% of the stu-dents
polled by FUSA wanted an
extra day added, "said Craig Haba,
FUSA Vice President of Student
Life and last year's Director of
Academics.
The concern of the admini-stration
at that time was the noise
level of the residence hall the night
before the Reading Day.
"It was a controversial is-sue
and I listened to what the stu-dents
thought should change, but it
all had to depend on the time being
used effectively for study, " Step-sis
said.
"My decision was based on
an accumulation of issues," added
Stepsis. "I received information
from different areas of the Univer-sity
that the night before [last
semester's third reading day] was
very disruptive."
According to Stepsis, the
first year the student leadership of
FUSA worked very hard to direct
that the noise be kept down, how-ever
the sense of purpose and dis-cussions
on the day has been lost as
that leadership faded away or went
on to graduation."
Haba, however, as Director of
Academics, said he had to monitor
Bannow, Canisius and the Library
the night before and he found all
buildings being well utilized.
In addition FUSA leader-ship
wrote a letter to The Mirror
last year and reminded Resident
Advisors and Housemasters to let
the student body know the day was
injeopardy of being removed if the
administration felt the time was
not being used wisely.
Brian McSherry, this year's
Director of Academics also sur-veyed
the RAs on duty to find out
if any incidents or disruptions had
occurred the night before last
spring's third reading day.
"All the responses were
highly positive and not one inci-dent
or disturbance was reported,"
said McSherry.
Julie Ruggiero, a RA in
Regis and a RA in Gonzaga last
year, experienced no disturbances
the night before.
"There is no crime in re-laxation
or using the time to get a
grip on finals week," she said.
"Everybody took advan-tage
of the extra reading day in a
positive way, in that the people
who had exams used the time to
study and the others were respon-sible
and respected the other kids
on the floor," she said.
As a student when there
were two reading days, Ruggiero
said she definitely felt less pres-sure
and made better use of her
timewith the extra day on the cal-endar.
Father Tom Regan, S.J., a
Resident Jesuit on the third floor of
(continued on p.3)
RecPlex To Keep Last Year's Schedule
New Events Planned to Benefit Students
Tom Rhatigan
Assistant News Editor
Last year, several students
expressed an interest in extending
the closing hours of the the
RecPlex, the university's recrea-tion
complex, beyond the usual
closing time of 10:00 p.m.
Rex Pringle, RecPlex direc-tor,
said there were no plans in the
works for extending hours because
"there would not be a high number
of students that would show up
that late."
"At first it would be a good
novelty, but after a while there
won't be much use," he added.
According to Pringle, ex-tending
the hours would not be
rnst ffffirient
The price for custodial serv-ices
and lifeguards would be too
much for too little people. Pringle
also said that it would be tough to
keep non-student workers to stay
that late.
Mike Hoffman, a junior at Fair-field,
said that there would proba-bly
be a great interest in keeping it
open later.
"Many people have late classes
or have to work and afterwards
they like to go to the Rec Plex and
have a good time," Hoffman said.
Carlo Camporeale, '91, how-ever,
said "keeping it open past
10:00 p.m. would put an extra
burden on the workers, because
nobody wants to say past
10:00p.m." .
Pringle, instead, is looking
into advanced planning programs
to be scheduled after closing, dur-ing
which Resident Advisors can
plan tournaments for their floors
and other groups can set up pro-grams
as well.
This way, according to Pringle,
the success of keeping it open late
for that one night will be assured.
The Rec Plex also has an-other
"Late Nite at the Rec Plex"
tentatively scheduled for April 5.
Last year's all-nighter, which in-cluded
basketball and volleyball
tournaments, was a huge success.
Several new events are also
in the works, including a Backyard
Classic, in which many outdoor
events will be scheduled at
Campion Field.
"We want to expand on
these one-day events and give the
students more opportunites to do
new things, " said Pringle.
He also added that the
RecPlex will be looking into im-proving
areas like the Campion
Field basketball courts and the
weight rooms.
"We understand the needs of the
students and all of our improve-ments
are aimed at making it better
for them," Pringle added.