A comprehensive overview of the current Ebola outbreak and why you should care as a St. Joe’s student. Pg. 7-9
THE HAWK THE HAWK September 24, 2014 October 29, 2014
The Student Newspaper of Saint Joseph’s University | Volume XCIII | Est. 1929 | www.hawkhillnews.com
A closer examination of study tour costs ERIN RAFTERY ’15 News Editor
O
ver the years, Saint Joseph’s University students have struggled with the costs of study tours, even causing the cancellation of several trips in the fall of 2013. These high costs are partially due to external vendors arranging accommodations for the trips. Thomas Kesaris, director of International Programs, says that the cost of study tours vary, but the program fee that students pay to attend the tour includes expenses such as round trip airfare, housing, mandatory health insurance, coordinator expenses for the necessary staff member to attend the trip, and a $175 contingency fee for emergency funds. Only meals and personal expenses are not covered for students. External vendors make arrangements for transportation, hotel bookings, and museum visits or any trips made during the
duration of the study tour, and therefore the money students pay for the program fee covers the cost of utilizing vendors, according to Kesaris. Kesaris explained that the process for planning a study tour begins when a faculty member requests a specific location to visit, decides how long they would like to stay, and the goals of the trip in relation to the course. The Center for International Programs then works to find a vendor to make the accommodations for the trip, and makes sure that there is competition through evaluating multiple bids. Once a vendor is selected, the details of the trip are worked out between the faculty member, CIP, and the vendor. “The program fee has to cover expenses, so we need to make sure that we have enough students to be able to run the study tour,” said Kesaris. “Once we know the study tour will run, we get an invoice from
Update on Wynnewood:
Renovations delay residence hall opening
the vendor and we pay usually the first installment or the second installment, for example.” According to Mary Anne Kucserik, assistant director for Study Abroad, some of the vendors the CIP is currently using are Executive Tours, Intl., Brazil Nuts Tours/ Destination Partners, and The Austral Group. “We don’t send funds directly to the hotel, we send the funds to the vendor, they in turn make the payments on behalf of our university to cover, again, the bus transportation, tour guides, any other expenses,” said Kesaris. James Carter, Ph.D., professor of history, said that the vendor helps to provide a cheaper price for his summer program in China, which is separate from a study tour in that the entire course is taught during the one-month trip. “Typically the vendors point is to get
us a better price than we’d be able to get on our own through their prior experience or through volume or working with other institutions,” said Carter. Jeanne Brody, Ph.D., an adjunct in the art department who is running a study tour to Italy for Art 203 Renaissance Art & Architecture, also said the vendor helps to provide safety and reassurance for parents by ensuring that the accommodations are trustworthy. “What I’ve been saying to the students who have been coming to these meetings is that it’s a lot of money...but you’re getting nice hotels...what mom and dad are getting is the security of having this trip be very much a supervised, organized [trip],” said Brody. Kesaris agreed that vendors are necessary for this purpose as well.
NICOLE SCALFARO ’16 Special to The Hawk
required contractors to open the walls of the building. The progression of these renovations led to complications and issues that prolonged the project. “We were finding that there were issues that were not seen, that would require a little bit more significant work to get done, to the point where the cost was just no longer feasible to the amount of renovations,” said Jeffery. The money that was needed to complete the renovations would not have been earned back after the reopening of the residence hall, said Cary Anderson, Ed.D., vice president of Student Life and associate provost. Anderson could not disclose the amount spent thus far on renovations. He said that the university is currently working with potential outside sources to assist in the development of the building, and he cannot share any figures which could alter the final cost. Continued WYNNEWOOD, Pg. 3
Wynnewood Hall will remain closed after two years of renovations, and its future remains unsure. The residence hall, located at 6318 City Avenue across from Merion Gardens, was closed for renovations after the 2011-2012 academic year. After the opening of Villiger Hall in the fall of 2012, there was a surplus of beds in campus housing. This made it an appropriate time to close Wynnewood Hall for renovations, according to John Jeffery, Ed.D., assistant vice president of Campus Life and director of Residence Life. Wynnewood Hall needed both cosmetic and structural renovations when the building was closed. These renovations were expected to be complete by the fall of 2014. Jeffery said that the renovations included electrical and wiring work, which
Continued STUDY TOURS, Pg. 3