What do you think about our forthcoming arena?

I see it every time I walk home from school: construction crews growling and lurching across the land next to Stevenson’s parking lots, leveling the ground and moving dirt from one spot to another. The gears of Progress are in motion, right? The people in charge of this undertaking certainly think so. They grinned and told us about all the wonderful benefits NIU would receive once the arena was built, and we were apparently eager to see it through. Thinking about it, though, was the student body really represented in this decision, or was the fix in long before we ever had a chance to voice our opinions?

Although the idea of an arena was tossed around for nearly 30 years, it wasn’t until about two years ago that NIU’s Board of Trustees approved its construction. Located on the west side of campus, the arena is expected to consume some 52 acres. At the time plans for the arena were coming into fruition, President John LaTourette stressed that “the convocation center would alleviate campus problems such as the lack of parking and the lack of an all-purpose facility where graduations and concerts can be held. Also, NIU’s need to show it is Title IX compliant could be met by adding a track for a women’s track team.” The catch, though, was that students would be left paying most of the $36 million bill. No problem, because after all, we wanted it … at least that’s what the BOT seemed to think.

I was curious to find out for myself what students thought about the arena, so this past weekend I went around asking a few people how they would use the arena’s money to improve the school. This wasn’t a formal inquiry by any means. I just wanted to cut through the BOT propaganda and find out how students really felt:

Raymond Fong, a junior undeclared business major, wanted to see more parking.

“We need more parking decks, like the ones near the computer/psych building,” Fong said.

Fong added that he’d improve the campus’ telecommunications network.

Caryn Simon, a junior elementary education major, said she would build “an overpass for students on Annie Glidden near Graham Hall.”

A lot of people said they would repair the road stretching around Stevenson North, going as far back as Grant North.

One student put it best when he said, “Let’s build a whole new road in front of Grant and Stevenson since the one that was supposed to be there seems to have disappeared.”

Julie Hartman, a senior criminology major, would use the money to improve the quality of education.

“If we’re willing to pay our educators more, we’ll attract a higher caliber of instructor,” she said.

Maria Papadopoulos, a junior nursing major, said she would provide greater security around campus at night.

I only talked to a handful of students here and still heard ideas that were just as good, if not better, than building an arena. I think students are more concerned with finding ways to improve the campus that are actually meaningful to them than in buying multimillion-dollar amenities. They want to improve what we already have, rather than funnel money into what we’ve successfully done without.

So I’ll ask the question one more time: Did administrators really listen to our opinions? I wish I could say they did, but I can’t shake the feeling that we weren’t at the top of their list of People Who Mattered when they decided to spend our money. Rather than taking the time to find out firsthand what we wanted, I think administrators said “the hell with it” and decided for us. The fix was already in. “Gauging student interest” was a formality for them, an annoying but necessary step to justify spending such a gross amount of money.

But what’s done is done, and I’m left with no other option now but to sit here and grow cynical in the knowledge that the only people who stand to profit from the arena are those who gambled the quality of our education on a pipedream.