USG OKAYS FIVE NEW STUDENT CLUBS - PAGE 2
FORDHAM OFFERING LDA HEALTH BENEFITS - PAGE 5
SERVING THE FORDHAM UNIVERSITY COMMUNITY FOR OVER 90 YEARS
1918-2010
MAY 5, 2010
VOLUME 92, ISSUE 11
Fordham Feels Spring Weekend Fever By JACOB TORPEY CONTRIBUTING WRITER
PHOTO BY STEPHEN MOCCIA/THE RAM
Record-sized crowds packed Martyrs’ Lawn for MGMT’s free concert and the Under the Tent Dance as Fordham celebrated its annual Spring Weekend tradition the weekend of April 30 through May 2. Students also had the opportunity to listen to the Ramblers, watch comedian Mike Birbiglia and get free breakfast, among other activities.
The Campus Activities Board’s organization of the 2010 Spring Weekend went off, it would appear, without a hitch. Fordham University’s end-of-the-year celebration managed to attract large crowds. “We were extremely happy with the way Spring Weekend turned out,” Nick Passantino, CBA ’10, president of CAB, said. “We had gorgeous weather all weekend and our events were well attended.” The celebration began with Wednesday night’s Campus Movie Fest. The exhibition of student films was held on McGinley Lawn at 8 p.m., showcasing the recent collection of student films made on and around campus. Wednesday night was marked by a large group of students watching “indie” style films on the lawn in a warm night under clear skies, a condition that would remain consistent throughout the rest of the weekend as well. Friday’s events began with a free lunch at Rodrigue’s Coffee House at 2:30 p.m. This particular event attracted a huge crowd of students, who assembled in a SEE SPRING WEEKEND ON PAGE 3
Security Gaffe Leaves Student Locked in Lombardi Door Locks Reinstalled, Security Policies Shifted After Female Student Inadvertently Spends Night Locked in the Vince Lombardi Center Weight Room By PATRICK DEROCHER NEWS EDITOR
A female student was locked in the Lombardi Center weight room overnight after entering the building to use the fitness facilities on April 22 and becoming trapped until student workers arrived the next morning. The student, who wishes to remain anonymous, said that she signed in at the front desk and entered the area at 11:20 p.m., worked out in the cardio room for about 10 minutes, and went on to the weight room. Seeing, from across the pool area, a security guard ushering students out of the cardio room at around 11:40, the student decided that it was prudent that she leave at that time. However, in attempting to exit the room, she found all doors locked, even though the weight and cardio room were not officially supposed to close until midnight. “I was banging [on the locked door] for about 40 minutes straight,” she said. After failing to get anyone’s attention, the student then thought to pull a fire alarm, thus alerting emergency officials to her plight. However, she discovered that there was, in fact, no fire alarm in that room. After waiting the entire night and into the morning for security to respond, “it was the lifeguard who was starting her shift at 6:10 a.m.,” she said. When asked about the situation, John Carroll, assistant vice presi-
dent of Safety and Security, was open about the matter, saying first of all that he was “sorry” about what the student involved in the matter had to go through and adding that numerous changes had been made since the mix-up. There have been, he said, four major changes since April 22. First of all, he noted that, prior to last week, security guards had shifts that ended at 12:30 a.m., under the assumption that 30 minutes would be a sufficient time in which to complete all necessary tasks. However, the shifts now last until 1 a.m. so as to ensure that all students, staff and faculty have left the area. The doors in the weight room, he said, should have been locked from the outside as well as the inside. As such, Carroll said that the locking and opening mechanisms on that door have been replaced. Additionally, the weight room will be closed at 10:30 p.m., along with the pool, so as to make it impossible to access the pool through the weight room. Finally, security guards will now be required to escort users out of Lombardi Center facilities at closing time, thus ensuring that no one gets stuck inside the facility. “Our goal is to make sure this can never happen again,” Carroll said of the incident and ensuing policy changes. He admitted that security officials closed parts of the Lombardi Center before official closing time, adding that he believes that the incident “was not her [the student’s] fault.”
Work being done on the center’s squash courts have led to a restructuring of the weight room, so students now have to pass through the pool area to reach the weights.
One of security’s concerns, Carroll said, was that students not run into trouble in the pool area. According to student pool employees, the changes that Carroll
alluded to were in place by the week of April 25 with Fordham security guards promptly escorting students out of the weight room after the pool’s closure.
PHOTO BY PATRICK DEROCHER/THE RAM
Lombardi Center policy has changed since the recent locked-in student incident, as reflected in new signage, such that the weight room is no longer open after the pool has closed for the evening at 10:30 p.m. The signs, however, are rather ad hoc, created using discarded printer paper and Lombardi Center sign-in sheets.
INSIDE Sports PAGE 19
Opinions PAGE 12
Culture PAGE 13
Softball team wins 16th game in a row, ranked No. 2.
In support of President Mary McAleese as commencement speaker.
The Ram reviews MGMT’s Spring Weekend performance.