I was eating lunch in Kimmel today, innocently reading the WSN, when I came across an ad for one of President John Sexton's "Town Hall" Meetings tonight at 9 pm in Kimmel 904. "Sweet." I thought, I can finally make it to one of these and see what the hell the SCRC/TBNYU kids are all badgering about. I have never heard him (John) answer questions candidly, and for the amount of money he makes us all spend to go here (I know I know, we don't have to enroll.) and lack of budget transparency (Which means, for the layperson, that there is no official statement made as to where our tuition money goes, and where money that is given by filthy rich fundraisers, including alumni, goes. So NYU could be spending our tuition money on the "Stress vegetables" they give out from the health center, and the tacky "tear it up" T-shirts with the obscene claw-print on the back, and the pomp and riffraff of A baseless event such as "100 Nights Before Commencement" before prioritizing that our money go towards assuring good teachers, or purchasing textbooks for us, or what have you. )The important stuff, essentially.
Now, where was I. Oh right, why I wanted to go to the town hall. Basically, I as a full- time matriculated student at NYU want to avail myself of the opportunities that are presented to me that ensure the student body as a whole a somewhat democratic and fair footing to remain between administration and students. Y'all get that, right?
If it got boring, I'd peace.
Unfortunately, I didn't get the chance to even enter the room of the meeting. I smelled trouble from the moment I stepped off the elevator on the 9th floor. 3 security guards greeted me with the seemingly irrelevant question "are you a graduate student?" I replied that I was not, to which they shook their heads and said "then you cannot go any further." I said "let me just try," and they did not object. So I walked to room 904, whereupon 2 more security guards greeted me outside the door. I recognized one of them; a burly middle aged white- haired man whose long waxen face could very well be a Modigliani. They, too, asked if I was a graduate student. I said no. They said "the town hall is only for graduate students."
"That's not what was written in the ad in the WSN today" I said
"Actually, you're wrong. It specified that it was only for grad students." He then darted inside the room, where I could see our beloved President donned a hoodless NYU sweatshirt, an amicable smile, and a trim white beard. I also noticed that there was approximately 5-10 people in attendance at this point (9:05 pm) and nearly 40 empty seats (I'm not the best estimator, I disclaim).
The security guard returned with the newspaper ad, which reads [and I quote] "President's Town Hall Meeting For Students of NYU Graduate Schools. All Graduate Students Welcome!"
OK, so it specifies graduate school, which I must have skipped over in my initial perusal at lunch today. But nowhere does it state that undergraduate students are unwelcome. So I replied to the security guard "Next time it should specify somewhere that undergraduates are not welcome."
"It's not about 'unwelcome' miss, it's just not for you."
"So I'm not allowed to sit in the back and listen?"
He turned to Mrs. Kimmel, a woman who frequents Kimmel, and thereby I deduce has some position of authority in this pasty yellow building. She said "we will be sure to alert you of the next town hall meeting for undergrads, but you have to leave now."
Defeated, I retreated to the handicap stall of the bathroom, and promptly cried. I write it plainly, because this is how it happened. I am still not sure why this encounter reduced me to tears. Or, shall I say, induced me to tears. I was frustrated, sure, but enough to cry? Methinks not. Maybe it was one of those 'right-beneath-the-surface emotions that was just waiting anxiously to hook onto a plausible catalyst for the camel's-back-breaking straw and open the floodgates. Either way, I had to walk back past these guards, into the elevator, and down to the 4th floor new shiny Kimmel laptop computer lab, open till 11 pm every week night.
As far as being treated like shit, this all came right after I passed a resident of my dorm walking away from an RA hovering above about 10 full pizza pies in the lobby of my dorm. I asked kindly and with a smile, "can I have a slice?" "Are you in the event?" He replied with biting sarcasm, cocking his head toward our 'lounge', which was full of students listening to a man with a combover talking about real estate.
Shot down, again.
The most difficult test attending NYU is how to reconcile myself with this newfound sense of brazen entitlement I feel surge inside of me with every 'free food', or even not-so-free- food, or anything else, encounter I come across. The real world isn't vying for my approval, I guess.
I feel the need to comment. I think the phrase is, "A wise man has eyes in his head." Then again, it's translated from Hebrew so it sounds words in English.
ReplyDeleteWow. I am thrilled that you commented. Really. thank you kindly, and i have already purchased a large [federal] reserve of pringle cans stacked neatly in my nyu dorm kitchenette cabinet circa who knows when.
ReplyDeleteI should point out that I just checked my email and saw that a new comment had been posted here. Excitedly, I refreshed the page, only to see that it was my own comment.
ReplyDeleteI think you have to consider what it is that you're really complaining about. If you're saying that the public safety people and the RAs are being rude and obnoxious, you may very well be right; your objection to that would be legitimate (obviously, as someone who was not there, I can't speak to it, but I'm fine taking your word that they were rude, since it matters more how you feel than what they intended).
ReplyDeleteIf, however, you're complaining about the fact that you weren't allowed into the events, then I have to disagree with your complaint. Regardless of attendance numbers, these events are explicitly aimed at other people. When an event is for graduate students, it implies that it's not for undergrads. Moreover, the guards can't let you in there to sit in the back and listen because, for all they know, you're lying and are just another obnoxious TBNYU miscreant (or any other student group, for that matter) just looking to further whatever insignificant cause they might pursue. As far as the RA is concerned, the pizza was for people attending that event; as someone not attending that event, you shouldn't just be entitled to free pizza simply for being an NYU student.
In general, the sense of entitlement felt by TBNYU and NYU students is a little out of line. We think that because we pay $50,000+ per year, we are entitled to make all kinds of demands on NYU. Would you buy a shirt from the Gap and then demand that Gap use the revenue from your purchase only to design the clothing that you want? No. Beyond that, we are choosing to pay that money; we know exactly what we're getting, and if we don't, then we have to blame the NYU students who give admissions tours as much as any administrator. (Side point: NYU students giving such an overwhelmingly positive review completely flies in the face of a lot of this, but never mind that for the moment).
We are not professional educators who have years of experience teaching others; we are snobby students who come from relatively affluent families and have nothing better to do than complain about the minuscule things that we perceive as wrong with this university. TBNYU are not civil rights protesters; their demands, aside from being disparate and disjointed, amount to little more than fluffy buzzwords. NYU isn't perfect and there's certainly what to improve; TBNYU neither used the appropriate means to affect change nor accurately captured the sentiments of anything more than a small piece of the student body.
Cool, a TBNYU hater comment.
ReplyDeleteAll that you say is true.
as far as us being "snobby students who come from relatively affluent families and have nothing better to do than complain about the minuscule things that we perceive as wrong with this university"
I have to take issue with that statement. It is pretty easy to say such a thing given the strife and poverty that the world is filled with, and our luxurious lifestyles in comparison. However, not all of us at NYU grew up in the suburbs of NJ/ Long Island with families that took us on tropical vacations every winter and gave us unlimited funds for shopping at Abercrombie when we turned 13.
But even if we were, those people are not necessarily defined by the status/situation into which they were born. I could have been born to a family in Somalia living in a mud hut. Being sexually abused by my dad. But I wasn't. So the life and existence and environment that I grew up in formed my conception of the status quo, and what else I would define as above or below the mediocre line, or to the right and left. Not that feelings can be equated, but I can have the same feeling when my grandma dies of natural causes that someone my age has while witnessing their sibling be shot and killed. (disclaimer: this argument has all sorts of holes, but im trying to touch on a point.)
Thank you for your considerable response.
...back to my Garlic flavored Melba toast with cheese.