Mirror - Vol. 26, No. 22 - April 26, 2001

              MASS APPEAL
Students rave about
Monday night mass.
Page 9
Music MAN
Read our exclusive inter-view
with Ben Harper.
Page 17
Fairfield
ApriJ 26, 2001
m jr The
University
Volume 26, Number 22
A BARRIER BETWEEN US
By Kristen Delaney
A celebra-tion
of the end
of the school
year, the com-ing
of beauti-ful
weather,
and the union
with friends
on the beach.
Clam Jam:
a Fairfield Uni-versity
tradition
taking place in the last
weekends of the spring se-mester.
Not if the year-round beach
residents have anything to say
about it.
The trial against the Lantern
Point Association has dragged on
for about a week now, with FUSA
president Kevin Hayes and Student
Court Chief Justice and RTM member
Tim Healy taking the stand for as many
as six hours at a time.
The temporary injunction has been
focusing on the gathering of students in
the common areas of Lantern Point, pri-marily
centering on Clam Jam. At this
stage in the suit, the questions revolve
around how the event is run, and what
improvements have occurred to increase
the safety of the event.
Healy said that some of the changes
for Clam Jam made regarded sanitation
and overall safety: the amount of port-a-
potties doubled from two to four. Ad-ditionally,
the number of buses taking
students back from the beach to the uni-versity
has also doubled.
Karaoke has also been eliminated
for this year, which was a primary resi-dent
complaint. Usually taking place
between Light House point, a year-round
resident area, and Lantern point, occu-pied
by students, this elimination has oc-curred
in order "to be more cognizant of
[year-round] residents," Healy said.
In an extra step to solidify the safety
of the event, additional police will be em-ployed
to patrol the area to prevent
crimes, which do include underage
drinking, said Healy. "I don't buy the
alcohol, nor does Kevin Hayes," Healy
said. As of now, there are no plans for
alcohol, as FUSA and the FBRA also do
not have a hand in the purchase of alco-hol
for the event. Therefore, it is a prod-uct
of individual student residents.
Healy said that the student organi-zation
wants "to oversee the safety of the
day not just for students, but the resi-dents
in the neighborhood as well... and
make it a safe day for students and resi-dents
alike."
However, some factors have made
the credibility of Fairfield students at the
beach less convincing. Recently, mem-bers
of a beach house went around sell-ing
wristbands to underclassmen for a
30-keg party at the Point this past week-end.
The student residents of Lantern
Point, who tried toclear the underclass-men
off the area, did not invite these stu-dents,
said Healy.
"One
of-the resi-dents
said
T don't
care about
your
court
case',"
Healy
said.
"Their
actions
are
purely for
their own interest to make
money for themselves...
Through their actions, they
may jeopardize the long
standing tradition of Clam
Jam." Although, the police
called in to break up the party
reportedly did not feel that the noise
was unreasonable, he said.
See "LAWSUIT" on p. 5
The merits ofpaying for quality
By Ethan Fry
SPORTS EDITOR
It is the worst deterioration of fac-ulty-
administration relations at Fairfield
since the faculty picketed Bellarmine
Hall about ten years ago in a contract
dispute.
And depending on the actions of the
faculty and university Board of Trust-ees,
the current conflict could lead to a
harmful impasse before students return
for the Fall 2001 semester.
The dispute is centered on the issue
of merit pay, endorsed by the Fairfield
administration and Board of Trustees,
but fiercely opposed by the faculty.
Merit pay is a form of compensa-tion
that-in theory-rewards the best and
brightest faculty members for various
forms of achievement, such as publica-tion
in scholarly journals or speaking at
academic conferences. But how to de-cide
who gets rewarded-and who does
not-has prompted faculty members to
discuss various issues with respect to
merit pay.
"Merit pay is not really about merit.
Merit is about control over the faculty."
Said Dr. Kevin Cassidy, a professor of
politics. "The administration does not
want us to have power. They want to
reduce every faculty member to an indi-vidual,
instead of having the faculty sal-ary
committee. They want to use it as
leverage."
Dr. George Lang, a professor of
mathematics and executive secretary of
the faculty's academic council, said that
merit pay "shifts the focus of the work
environment from internal rewards, like
teaching and research, to one in which
you focus on whatever boxes you have
to check off."
Dr. Michael Tucker, a business pro-fessor
and President of the Faculty Wel-fare
Committee, the Fairfield chapter of
the American Association of University
Professors, was critical of evaluative
process in a merit system, saying, "What
does merit reward? Only things that can
be observed."
The president of Fairfield Univer-sity,
Father Aloysius P. Kelley, refused
to comment on the issue after being con-,
tacted by the Mirror. "I think it is pref-erable
at this time that you restrict ad-ministrative
comments to those of the
Academic Vice President Grossman. He
is the one who is engaging the faculty
on the issue and preparing for the con-tinuation
of the discussions," Kelley
said.
The dispute began last September
when Academic Vice President Dr. Orin
Grossman sent a memo to the general
faculty calling for a discussion of merit
pay. In his memo, he also proposed
changes to the current system in which
the administration and faculty formulate
salary changes.
Every year, the Faculty Salary Com
See "MONEY MATTERS" on p. 4