This August 19th marked the first semester back since Sonoma State’s ginormous budget cuts and the effects are being felt.
If you had been here last year and the years before, you might have felt the significant chunk of people lacking in attendance recently. Parking seems a lot easier to find, less snaking through crowds, and although we were at a small school before, decreased class sizes.
With no sporting events to attend or promote, the Recreation Center has even had to take a step in to encourage people to still get out and experience the campus but beyond that, what is there to experience?
If you’re like me and have any classes past Darwin (which is practically the majority of campus) you may have seen these tables set up outside Salazar Hall. When I think of singular tables sitting out at college campuses I think of the meme of the guy who is asking people to debate him or even something set up for a Greek House promotion. Instead what I’ve seen filling up the table space is … a credit card company?
In the first week of school where many students are finally out in the world on their own for the first time, is it not a little predatory that these companies are coming out convincing 18 year olds to sign up for credit cards?
I didn’t get my first credit card until I had a full time job and the means to actually pay it off. To be advertising this to young students who may not even have a part time job, on-campus job, and maybe not even a car? It feels weird to me.
During a time like this where life on campus is so rigid and overwhelming, I think it’s important to try to uplift and encourage engagement with students instead of setting them up for credit card traps.
I can’t directly blame the university for this, and that is not my intent. The point I want to make is that with fewer students and faculty on campus it’s us who are still here responsible for creating a better atmosphere for freshmen.
If I were to give my opinion on the unfolding of last year, it felt like the school was soft-closing. Quietly trying to get rid of sports and majors so that eventually it’d be nothing more than a teaching credential school.
It was only my second semester here so I had no ties to this school in any significant way but to see how the community banded together really made me feel like I should care.
And now at the beginning of this semester we suddenly got all the money back but people still lost their jobs, my friends had to move to different schools, and sports are still gone!
When we lost 23 million dollars we got told in email after email the things we would be losing as a school. After getting a whopping 45 million, the district has gone immediately quiet and now we have no idea what this money is being planned to be used for. Makes you think it’s because it’s not in the interest of student life.
But hey, sign up for a Bank of America credit card account with a free $200 sign on bonus if you spend $500 dollars in the first two months! (Do not do that.)
