The Omnibus

Issue date: 9/28/07 Section: Forum

Media Credit: Peter Studor Late-coming students flood Pike Auditorium on Monday Sept. 24. An alternative needs to be found to accommodate the growing student body. Students should not have to sit on the floor. [Click to enlarge]

It was Monday, Sept. 17, and I was late to Chapel. My friend and I arrived in the middle of "Mondays with Dane and Dave," and Pike Auditorium was packed. The few seats we saw available were smack in the middle of the mob of students, and the fact that these seats were solitary told us they were probably some of the broken seats in Pike Auditorium. Instead we joined the group of students sitting along the wall on the right aisle of Pike Auditorium.
We didn't pull out our laptops, cell phones or homework. We just sat there trying to catch up on the Chapel announcements. All of us sitting on the floor were suddenly approached by a Southwest Baptist University staff member who told us to get up and find seats and walked off before we could respond.
Since we had already tried to find seats and deemed there were none, we all stayed where we were in order to receive our Chapel credit. We were joined on the floor by other SBU staff members, and I saw others come into Pike Auditorium, take one look at the overflow of students and staff, and leave.
After this incident I realized that the staff member probably told us to get off the floor and find a seat because we were creating a fire hazard by sitting there. We weren't blocking exits, but we were sitting in the aisle causing an obstacle to other students should such an emergency occur. But what could we do? This University requires that we go to Chapel in order to graduate, a requirement I am perfectly happy to meet, but when the University does not provide a safe means for me to attend Chapel, I find it hard to see the logic in requiring it.
Currently, Pike Auditorium can seat approximately 1,100 people. However, about 30 seats are broken. With undergraduate enrollment at 1,560 students, Pike Auditorium cannot adequately seat the entire undergraduate student body. Even though some of these 1,560 students are exempt from Chapel, the overflow of students on the floor shows that the number of exempt students does not exceed 460.

Continued...

Page 1 of 2 next >

Article Tools