Mirror - Vol. 23, No. 10 - December 11, 1997

              FAIRFIELD UNIVERSITY
IRROR
Volume 23 Number 10 The Image of Fairfield
TH basements
deemed unsafe
for parties
Sarah Redman
Contributing Writer
It is a typical Friday
night in the townhouses. Stu-dents
are packed into the base-ment
dancing, drinking, and so-cializing.
It takes a tremendous
effort to even make it across the
crowded cement floor to get to
the basement stairs, and even the
stairs are blocked with people
going up and down.
"I guess there is really
no safe way out if there ever was
a fire but I don't know how to
make the basements safer," Carla
Gazlay' 98 said. "I don't want to
lose them. Then where would
we have our parties?"
Students are not the
only ones concerned about the
safety of townhouse parties in
basements. Joseph Boucard, the
university fire marshal, recently
voiced his concern in a letter to
Gwen Vendley, associate dean
of students.
"The intent of the base-ment
area was always for stor-age
and mechanical equipment.
This area conforms to that,"
Boucard said. "If this area is
being used other than storage,
such as living space, place of
public assembly, it would place
the university or the occupants
at risk for improper usage."
Members of UNITE,
the "university townhouse ex-perience",
have been informed
of the concern and have dis-cussed
possible solutions. In-stalling
rubber treading on the
basement stairs, limiting the
number of students permitted
in the basement during parties,
and providing more support to
the staircases are all being con-sidered
as options, said UNITE
member Kerry O'Callaghan
'98.
According to the let-ter
from the Boucard, places of
assembly require certain fea-tures,
"such as proper lighting,
emergency lighting, proper
egress widths, proper exiting,
University library
lacks all-night study
rooms
Patrick Duffy
Contributing Writer
As exams begin, stu-dents
seem to become increas-ingly
anxious when it comes to
their academics. Some students
say that the university library,
which would seemingly relieve
some of the pressure, may
merely be adding insult to in-jury-
"It reminds me of my
high school library," Dan Hary
'01 said. "That can't be good."
"We all know that the
library is outdated and that's
being addressed," FUSA Presi-dent
Chris Cipriano said.
In regards to studying
facilities, Cipriano stated that
the Mezzanine has been a
student's only alternative.
"Yes, we need a twenty-four
hour study room," he said.
"I think the library
stinks. It should have a twenty-four
hour room," Scott
Satkowski, a transfer student
from St. Lawrence University,
said. "At St. lawrence Univer-sity,
our library was about three
times the size of Fairfield's.
We had a study area that was
open all night."
Joan Overfield, asso-ciate
university librarian, said
that the age of the library plays
a major role in regards to its
overall size and amount ofvol-continued
on
The "unsafe" basement stairs of a townhouse.
photo: M. Parsons
sprinkling, travel paths, etc.
Basements generally don't
meet much if any of this type of
criteria," he said. .
Vendley has offered
some of her own solutions to
the problem. She suggests
keeping the parties upstairs and
maybe having the keg in the
basement. One or two students
could go up and downstairs,
acting as "runners". This would
limit the number of students
who would be in the basement
ifthere ever was need to evacu-ate
quickly, Vendley said.
"It seems like it should
be a concern, but I don't think
blocking the basements off al-together
is a solution, or trying
to limit the number of students
permitted downstairs is a good
idea either," Liz Riccio '98
said. "I don't know what would
be a really safe solution because
students are going to have par-ties
regardless."
"It is like putting a kid
without a seat belt in the front
seat," Vendley said. "It's an
accident waiting to happen. We
can simply not have students at
risk, and right now it is unsafe
for students to be down there."
page 3-
Thursday, Decemberll, 1997
Senior Jessica Grossarth led the Stags past For
and into the championship game of the Warner
Inside this
week
Feeling
stressed?
You're not alone. Find
out why students are turning to
the Counseling Center, seep. 5
Did you catch
"the virus?"
Find out how one student
copes, see p. 8
A tribute to
Mirror advisor
A special thanks to Profes
sor Andi Rierdan, see p. 9
What's going
on at the
beach?
Student talks about the
current situation at the
beach, see p. 12
Roaches
in the
cafeteria?
Staff writer writes on
what students have seen,
seep. 13
Get Festive!
Read how to deco-ratefor
the holidays, see
p. 15
Take a bite out
of the Big Apple
Check out a New York
City bar crawl, see p. 18.
Sports has a
surprise for
you!
See pages 19-21