On the Campus - May 19, 1999
Website Exclusives...
Send money, please!
Asking former Campus Club members to donate is an introduction to
marketing
SO YOU'RE SICK of Princeton calling you for money. Eating Clubs, sports
teams, and Annual Giving interrupt your dinner once a year wanting "a
small donation," even though you probably paid more to attend Princeton
than the GDP of most developing nations. Haven't you done enough?
But take pity on the callers-it's just as rough to be on the other end of
the line. That's where I was recently during a Campus Club phonathon to
raise money for run-down windows, a boiler, and a 40-year-old fire alarm.
Our phonathon consisted of a bunch of us sitting in the "Annual Giving
Room" (yes, they have a room specifically for getting money!) each
with a pretty intimidating phone, a list of hopefully sympathetic Campus
alumni, and a politely worded script. You would think that calling people
you have never met and never will meet wouldn't be too stressful, but trust
me, it is.
TIME TO REMINISCE
Overall, though, most people were pretty friendly, especially the older
gentlemen who wanted to spend a bit of time reminiscing. OK, a lot of time
reminiscing. The most excited was a former Campus president: "Sure!
I guess I should donate a bit. Do they give you guys enough pizza and beer?"
Most answers were "maybe," "send me the information,"
and "you've caught me at a bad time." Young women were by far
the most brutal. My favorite: "I was wondering if you would be interested
in making a donation to Campus Club. . .?" "No." Click.
The odd thing about being in this AG room is that everyone around you is
doing exactly the same thing, which simultaneously puts you at ease and
makes you feel like a cold-blooded mercenary. It also lets you hear alternative
approaches, like the guy across the table from me: "Hey, this is Jake
from Campus Club-you used to be in it. We're asking for money." I don't
think he got much of a response.
Pieces drift in from other callers too: "Yes, we do have women now.
No, I don't mind. I actually like it." "Oh, I'm sorry. Good luck
with the operation." "You were in Cloister?"
Since I speak Spanish, I got the list of alumni living in Puerto Rico. Not
one answered the phone in Spanish. In McLean, Virginia, and Washington,
D.C., on the other hand, phones weren't answered in English.
OR SHOULD IT GO TO STARVING CHILDREN
One guy patiently listened to my spiel, by this time a little wooden, and
answered politely: "No thanks. I think if I give money there are people
who need it more than Campus Club." I actually agree with him. I think
if I had money I would rather give it to starving children in Somalia than
to Princeton college students. But even at Princeton there are different
degrees of need. Last year I was on the club sailing team, which can't sail
without boats, gets almost no funding from the university, and has big expenses
and a small alumni list. Donations were what kept us on the water. And even
Campus Club, which could probably exist with decaying windows and a broken
boiler, is both a legacy of its former members and a growth experience for
students. It's hard on us poverty-stricken college kids, and while we have
it better than most, we can always use a little help from those who can
spare it.
This doesn't mean you have to give us money when we call you, but just give
us a chance to tell you who we are and what we want, and then make your
refusal a polite "no thank you." We don't really mind. In the
end, after spending an hour talking to about 35 people I got $25 in an on-the-spot
credit-card gift, two pledges, and about 15 outright no's. More than the
money, this experience gave me an appreciation for credit-card hawkers and
the invisible telemarketing underworld-especially those whose jobs are on
the line instead of a new boiler.
Of course, this has also given me something to look forward to after I graduate.
The infrastructure of Campus Club is bound to decay further, and someone
has to pay for it. I had better start making money.
-Emily D. Johnson '01
Emily D. Johnson is PAW's intern.
Primping for Houseparties
The appeal of Gatsby-esque romance comes once a year
As I write this column in the second week of April, students are beginning
to squirm under a looming spring deadline -- and no, I'm not talking about
the junior paper or the senior thesis. I'm talking about another yearly
ritual that involves just as much planning and twice as much intrigue: Houseparties.
Yes, it's true: the build-up to this blessed event -- which takes place
the first weekend in May -- consumes almost as much time as it takes to
produce an issue of PAW.
Actually, the comparison isn't a bad one. Just like a magazine journalist
seeking the truth about the Nude Olympics, the pre-Houseparties student
must do a good deal of research. For women, this usually begins with a fact-finding
trip to the local mall, where they claw through racks of chiffon and satin
seeking the perfect source -- of compliments, that is. And at about this
time, one's dream date becomes an obsessive "beat." These cub
reporters, male and female, will calculatingly time their walk to class
or their arrival at lunch, since even a minute or two can be crucial in
securing a "chance" encounter.
Of course, it is the interviews that make the story. At first, everything
is off the record, as students confer with roommates, clubmates, and classmates
to get the scoop on the object of their affections. But soon deadline pressure
forces them to seek direct quotes, and they must face the dreaded moment
of posing the question.
Framing Princeton's major social occasion in this manner may seem absurd,
especially to those who remember Houseparties as a dreamy, Gatsby-esque
promenade down Prospect Street. Yet the journalistic analogy is appropriate,
both for Houseparties in particular and for relationships in general. At
Princeton, students approach even matters of the heart with a detached objectivity,
and conversations about love adopt a preceptorial tone. Perhaps it's the
campus's Gothic walls that bestow on Princeton's youth the almost medieval
sense of propriety that hems in their passions like an outgrown corset.
Or maybe it just proves Princetonians are such natural academics that they
run a cost-benefit analysis before they ask someone out on a date.
In any case, Princeton's dating scene (or, more accurately, lack of)
is a common frustration among students. Men and women equally complain that
the opposite sex is stonewalling, uninterested, and cold; but they, as a
representative of their sex, are willing to meet the other halfway. Yet
these two halves somehow never equal a whole, turning the campus into a
proving ground for Zeno's paradox.
So what's the answer? One student said it succinctly: "People here
are just too scared to admit that they like each other." If this is
true, then Princeton ranks barely above junior high level in the maturity
department. Should McCosh Health Center offer a vaccine for cooties?
Evidence suggests that students have developed their own antidote to
the self-imposed monastic conditions in which they live. Among students,
it is known as "hooking up," but for some distant alumni, this
term may warrant some explanation. The basic idea is that two people meet
at a party, dance a couple of times, and then proceed to play the bases
-- with the final score being anywhere from stolen kisses on the steps of
Cap and Gown to waking up the next morning in an unfamiliar bunk. What happens
that next morning, wherever the two end up, is usually a reawakening of
objectivity. The couple go their separate ways, and although, on a small
campus, they are bound to meet again, it is usually in the form of awkward
glances on McCosh Walk as they hustle to their next lecture.
The partners and results of these hook-ups can become the basis either
for ambiguous boasting or unambiguous regret. So what are students trying
to prove by rejecting relationships but coveting these brief -- and potentially
dangerous -- trysts?
Examining the issue from an academic perspective, a psychology major
would say emotional security. Another student's theory is that quick hook-ups
sate students' loneliness without requiring emotional commitment, which
they fear because it "interferes with what they've come here for."
Indeed, from a purely practical point of view, the trend is sadly understandable.
After all, busy students don't put out a magazine every two weeks; if the
agony of pre-Houseparties were year-round, we probably wouldn't be able
to graduate on time.
So perhaps this is why the annual promenade of chiffon and cummerbunds
elicits such blissful anticipation and tedious preparation from students
who are usually too busy to primp and pine for the cute boy or girl in their
history lecture. Too bad it's only once a year that Gatsby-esque romance
has a place on campus; but in the overachieving Princeton tradition, we
might as well go all out for that first weekend in May.
-Nancy Smith '00
Nancy Smith (nmsmith@princeton.edu)
is a junior in the Woodrow Wilson School.
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