Former ‘Real World’ star to visit NIU

By Lisa Weber

Another celebrity visits campus as MTV “Real World” cast member Julie Stoffer stops by the Carl Sandburg Auditorium tonight.

“We were trying to get a larger-scale event to get more people to attend,” said Lisa Skaggs, coordinator of the Campus Activities Board’s Unity in Diversity committee. “We called around to different agencies, and we found Stoffer.”

The 20-year-old from Delafield, Wis., is on tour talking about diversity issues.

“‘The Real World’ usually has diversity in their house, so we thought that she would be a good speaker,” Skaggs said.

A question-and-answer session will follow Stoffer’s speech, and fans can meet her from 8 to 8:45 p.m.

Stoffer attended Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah. As a sophomore, she began to feel pressured to follow the culture of the university, which was mainly Mormon. She either had to pursue the culture or get married.

At the beginning of her junior year, she picked up a copy of the university’s newspaper, where a front-page article told of MTV coming to Provo for a casting call. She and her friend decided to try out, even though Brigham Young didn’t allow MTV on campus and her parents wouldn’t let her watch the show.

One of 40,000 applicants, Stoffer was notified on the last day of school that she had become a cast member on “The Real World New Orleans.” After taping the show, she received a letter from Brigham Young notifying her that she was suspended from school for violating the honor code.