Anger over students being turned away from Friday's pep rally provoked discussion at Monday's Campus Life Council (CLC) meeting.
"We need to find a better way to get people into pep rallies," Knott rector Brother Jerome Meyer said. "We need something better than one small door. More gates need to be open for our students so there is less pushing and shoving. Someone needs to look at this."
Members debated the issue and explored ways to improve the situation before the next pep rally on Oct. 14.
"Students in my dorm came up to me saying that 200 students weren't allowed in the pep rally because they oversold tickets," Knott senator and Social Concerns task force co-chair Jacques Nguyen said. "They came 15 minutes before it started. What action should we take?"
Hall Presidents Council co-chair Dan Zenker said the hall presidents were told prior to the pep rally that the student Joyce Center doors would close at 5:45 p.m. on Friday.
Diversity Council representative Joyce Randall said something had to be done to fix the problem.
"Didn't alumni have their fair shot when they attended here?" Randall said. "Shouldn't students have their shot at going to their pep rallies? There should never be a time when you turn students away from cheering on their own team."
Members decided Zenker should work on the issue when he meets with Student Activities Office assistant director Peggy Hnatusko on Tuesday.
"We have another month before the next pep rally," Zenker said. "I'm glad I heard your concerns. We were expecting crowds but the Joyce Center had a way of doing it that was not efficient."
In other CLC news:
u The three CLC task force chairs reported on the progress of their committees.
Chief executive officer and Social Concerns task force co-chair Liz Kozlow told members the committee touched on many issues at last week's meeting.
"We talked about a woman becoming president at Notre Dame," Kozlow said. "We discussed rectors' oversight over dance and T-shirt themes and the need for Campus Ministry to provide more services for non-Catholics or at least improve advertising for those events taking place off campus."
Campus Grounds and Structures task force chair James Leito said his committee had been investigating vandalism.
"We want to find out where rectors stand on the issue [of vandalism] and start a joint effort," Leito said. "We are in the research stage to find out which offices deal with these things."
The Student Voice and Input task force, chaired by Stanford senator David Thaxton, met last week to research student involvement in the University.
"We need to see what the status is of student involvement at Notre Dame. Then we want to get an idea of how Notre Dame stands compared to 10 peer institutions," Thaxton said. "We also looked into student involvement in different departments like catering, dining halls and the president's office."
u The group decided to check on the status of a safety resolution that last year's Security task force worked on extensively.
"Let's look at how the resolution exists now and decide what this year's CLC can do with it and go from there," Carroll rector Father Jim Lewis said. "Do we want to add to it? Or do we want to write something entirely different?"
