The Quinnipiac University Student Government Association announced the complete 2018-2019 executive board Monday, four days after initially announcing grievances were filed resulting in an investigation that halted the announcement of the SGA president, vice president and vice president of finance.
In an email addressed to the Quinnipiac community, SGA Vice President for Public Relations Victoria Johnson said the grievances filed on election day were based on allegations of potential voter influence. In the consequent investigation SGA found the grievances unjustified.
“The combination of the grievance process, appeal proceedings, and an in-depth investigation of actual votes cast has now allowed the Election Committee to verify mathematically, without question, that the outcome of each position under review could not have been impacted by any potential influence,” Johnson said.
It’s still unclear who filed the grievances, though Johnson said the grievances can be filed anonymously.
The recently announced executive board positions are as follows:
April is sexual assault awareness month. With the rise of the #MeToo movement and the number of high profile people accused of sexual misconduct, experts at Quinnipiac University feel a shift in awareness.
“(The faculty) have talked about feeling like there is a little bit of a wave and a push toward addressing and talking about these issues and acknowledging them and trying to change culture,” Courtney McKenna, the director of student affairs at QU, said.
But according to women’s studies professor Melissa Kaplan, the push is not enough.
“Women aren’t equal yet,” Kaplan said. “When women will feel equal is when women no longer fear rape.”
As the director of student affairs, McKenna sees herself as the overseer of the “care team,” which helps students who have concerns including those related to rape and sexual assault. She also organizes the online prevention programs students take at the beginning of their freshman year as well as all the sexual assault events on campus.
She said her trick to juggling so many responsibilities is to not go it alone.
“The goal is to find students and organizations and offices and programs on campus who are equally as interested in the topic and engage those folks to do the programs,” McKenna said. “Do events to bring awareness in the ways that make sense to their members.”
However, according to Kaplan, those events have a narrow audience and they are largely optional.
“When you make things that are optional you’re most likely going to be speaking to students who have been survivors or victims or know somebody who has,” Kaplans said. “Predominantly it’s only going to be students, or students that are told to go because of the courses that they are taking.”
McKenna agrees.
She said many classes in the college of arts and sciences like health science, psychology and sociology have higher participation in sexual assault awareness events. But more recently she has tried to expand that audience.
“I think some of the ways we need to move forward is looking at like, the school of business,” McKenna said. “Statistically it’s the school that has the most amount of men so we (need to) look statistically at those who may need to make sure they are aware of expectations, policies, how they can play a role to shift culture.”
The role of men in sexual assault awareness and feminism is something that Kaplan teaches in her women’s studies classes. She also feels like it’s not always talked about in the right way.
“Even the structure of consent is problematic because it is positioning women as kind of the gatekeeper, and puts the responsibility on women to say no. Rather than putting the responsibility on men to read women,” Kaplan said.
From McKenna’s point of view the issue of consent is one of the biggest issues surrounding sexual assault because many students coming to college don’t have any education about it before they move in.
“We have have sex ed, but we don’t have consensual sex ed. We don’t have ‘how do you talk about what you want from a partner’ and ‘how do you know when you should engage in activities and when you shouldn’t’ and ‘what is a healthy dating relationship?’” she said.
One way the student affairs office can get information about the knowledge and behaviors of the incoming freshmen is through the AlcoholEdu and Haven programs. These are short online courses required by all students at the beginning of their freshman year.
“We have good data that shows even if some folks are just clicking through it and think its stupid that there is an increase in knowledge from before someone takes it and after someone takes it,” McKenna said. “We get good static data about each incoming class.”
For example, McKenna said she can find out that 30 percent of students in an incoming class are what would be considered binge drinkers before even coming to college, or that 15 percent have experienced some sort of sexual assault.
Through the company that puts out AlcoholEdu and Haven, the student affairs office is looking to roll out smaller, ongoing courses. McKenna said they wouldn’t be the “heavy lift” one that freshmen do, but it will give the office more data about the change over time.
According to Kaplan, this is essential because “we have to put pressure on everyone to end this kind of violence and this epidemic.”
Quinnipiac University students, staff and faculty gathered in the recreational center this morning for their largest event for community service, the Big Event.
Around 1600 participants and 200 teams spread out to over 100 sites throughout Connecticut and helped out in any way possible. Participants volunteered at specific locations including private residences, the Hamden Youth Center, senior living centers, and the New Haven Green.
“They will do anything the site needs them to do whether it’s walking dogs, painting or an outside clean up,” co-director Katie Wilcox-Smith said.
Wilcox-Smith said students were excited and ready to get out in the community as they started filling the recreational center at 8 a.m. for check-in. It’s an event that brings the whole Quinnipiac community together.
“It’s civic engagement and I think it’s really important to do community service and it’s a great way for the community to come together,” Wilcox-Smith added.
Participants headed out to various locations around 9:30 a.m. and provided their services until 1 p.m. One team, Quinnipiac sorority Delta Delta Delta, volunteered at the Southington Sloper YMCA and moved picnic tables and picked up garbage.
“It’s nice to help them because they need to get ready for the upcoming April break for the kids,” senior Jessica Ciccarella said.
After the participants finished, they headed back to the recreational center to close out the day.
Updated Sunday at 6:17 p.m.
Wilcox-Smith is hoping next year is bigger and better than ever as its their 10th annual Big Event.
Members of the Quinnipiac community taking their seats for the opening ceremony of the Big Event.
Students prepare to span out and volunteer at the Big Event.
QU President John Lahey speaks to students before they head out.
Boomer welcomes in Bobcats to the opening ceremony of the Big Event.
HQ Press writer Mary Rose Bevins poses with Boomer.
Quinnipiac student Zurama Rodriquez gets ready to head out to volunteer.
Courtesy of Anna Castro
Members of the Quinnipiac fraternity Zeta Beta Tau working on gardens in New Haven.
Courtesy of Ryan Marcis
Zeta Beta Tau brothers raking leaves in a New Haven garden.
Courtesy of Ryan Marcis
More Zeta Beta Tau fraternity brothers cleaning up the grounds in a New Haven garden.
Click through the photos to view the slideshow of students out volunteering during the Big Event.
With 39 days left until commencement, graduating students were able to secure tickets for their loved ones on April 3 at noon. The process of receiving decent seats is known to be a competitive process and sometimes stressful, but some students in particular were not expecting all the technical difficulties that arose.
The Commencement ticketing servers are experiencing technical issues this afternoon. We apologize for the inconvenience. Our vendor is aware of the situation and is working on a solution. We will continue to monitor the issue and notify you when it has been resolved.
Hey @QuinnipiacU is there a particular reason why you have the ticket portal for 6 different graduations go live at the same time? It’s slowing down the system and students aren’t getting tickets to their own graduation #OneLastScrewover#ThnksFrThMmrs
Note: this article was updated on April 9 to clarify Sara MacDonough’s comments.
When Nicole Connery signed with Quinnipiac’s women’s ice hockey team for the 2012 season she didn’t know the suffering she would endure for the next three years.
Coaches from her hometown of Newmarket, Ontario, warned her when she told them where she was going. They told her they had heard things.
“But I was like, a lot of coaches yell,” Connery remembered.
Rick Seeley was Connery’s coach at Quinnipiac until her junior year when the university fired him in April 2015 for verbal and physical abuse of his players. But according to student surveys originally reported by Q30 Television, students had been reporting incidents since 2009.
“It could have been avoided earlier if our surveys were read and understood,” Connery said. “It’s the only thing I don’t understand of how those things were swept under the rug. I’ll never understand that.”
Every student athlete fills out a survey at the end of his or her season. After Connery’s first year she said she wrote long and honest answers detailing the abuse. But after a while she figured no one seemed to be listening.
Photo courtesy of Nicole Connery
In her first survey, Connery described an incident where Seeley had the team run from the Mount Carmel campus to York Hill at 5 a.m. Afterward they had practice without an athletic trainer and a player tore a ligament in her knee.
After her sophomore year, Connery said since she didn’t feel like administrators were listening to the surveys. She just wrote that Seeley, “probably shouldn’t aim a slapshot at a player that did something wrong in practice.”
A more public incident at an NCAA tournament loss against Harvard sparked the end of the abuse.
Seeley not only started swearing at his players, but also grabbed one by the facemask. Another coach had to pull Seeley off of the player.
“Not only did we all see the incident but my parents, other parents, parents on the other team, and players on the other team saw this incident and was horrified,” said one player in her anonymous survey.
Former athletic director Jack McDonald, who was at Quinnipiac during the Seeley scandal, declined to comment on the incident.
The university hired Sarah Fraser in 2016, so she wasn’t around for Seeley’s firing. However, as the deputy director of athletics she is now one of the administrators who reads the athlete surveys.
Fraser is also the senior women administrator at Quinnipiac, a role designed to promote women within the school, according to the NCAA.
She said the student athlete surveys are anonymous because they allow student athletes to feel more comfortable being honest. While she said she feels strongly that they should stay that way, she also thinks the anonymity makes it hard for administrators to pinpoint problems.
“The challenge is not being able to follow up with somebody to get additional detail or verify how true something may be,” said Fraser.
This challenge may be part of why physical, verbal and emotional abuse is widespread in high-level sport – and why it’s been traditionally ignored. Players say that the culture demands that athletes tough it out for fear of retaliation or being seen as weak. So they don’t usually speak up. This leads to a communication barrier between athletes and coaches that can leave abusive behavior hiding in plain sight.
In fact, nearly half of all current or former athletes have experienced some negative interaction with a coach, whether they felt like the coach was picking on them, or crossed a line, according to an online survey of 62 current or former high school and college athletes in the U.S.
It’s a decades-long problem that has recently gotten the spotlight because players are starting to speak out.
Earlier this year, a Michigan court sentenced former USA Gymnastics (USAG) team doctor Larry Nassar on sexual assault charges. The statements from the hundreds of girls and women Nassar abused exposed the true abusive culture of USAG’s desire to win more medals. Meanwhile, a book published back in 1995 explained the abusive culture of elite gymnastics, yet the governing body did nothing until gymnasts started speaking up.
But most athletes do not speak up, according to the online survey. One anonymous respondent said, “we are taught to put our heads down and deal with it.” Many ignored negative interactions with their coaches. But that has consequences.
A study from 2008 found that emotional abuse, rather than verbal or physical, had the most negative effect on the well being of 14 elite, retired swimmers. The study defined emotional abuse as “sustained and repeated patterns of contact-free harmful interactions between an athlete and caregiver (coach) that resulted in emotional upset of the athlete.”
Quinnipiac fired Seeley for verbal and physical abuse, but the surveys also show signs of emotional abuse.
“He even told a member of the team that she was in fact nothing to this team and that she was worthless,” said one student athlete in a 2013 survey. “He told a girl … when she was ready to quit that if she goes home all she will be is a waitress and that she will have no life.”
The study also found emotional abuse was the least studied form of abuse, especially in athletics. But it’s one of the most common.
In another 2004 study, all interviewed athletes said their coach had abused them in some way. This resulted in them feeling worthless, lacking self confidence, depressed, humiliated or fearful.
The study went on to point out that these feelings lead to a “lack of belief in their own ability to perform,” which ultimately ends up making them play worse.
Also, the “only the strong survive/no pain, no gain” attitude is a myth according to Celia Brackenridge, the director of the Centre for Youth Sport and Athlete Welfare at Brunel University in West London.
“This attitude reflects institutional intolerance for maltreating athletes and overlooks the longer term harm that can result for ‘tough’ training and coaching regimes,” said Brackenridge in a 2010 keynote address at the “How Safe is Your Sport” conference.
Sara MacDonough, Quinnipiac University athletic trainer and mental health liaison said she couldn’t comment on the women’s ice hockey incident. But in general she thinks communication could be a way to foster a good relationship between athletes and coaches.
“If you can talk it out and understand where people are coming from and understand why they’re doing what they’re doing, then no one abuses their power and we can keep that check and balance in place,” she said.
According to former student athlete Connery, communication wasn’t always a solution for her. While her friends would go to other staff members to “let it out and cry,” Connery said she had no one she felt like she could trust. She said Seeley gave the impression that if anyone talked it would get back to him and they would be punished.
“For me it was hard because I never let myself flush out those feelings, what I had was just bottled up,” Connery said. “It’s not good for your health and you end up numb. Communication was just non-existent for me.”
Kelly Frassinelli, the field hockey coach and senior woman administrator at Southern Connecticut State University, said every school handles the role a little differently.
At Southern, Frassinelli’s role as SWA can include sitting down with athletes and talking with them about athletic, academic or social problems. As the field hockey coach she has regular meetings with her players to check in. However, in addition to communication on the athlete’s end, coaches must have a strong moral compass, Frassinelli said.
“I guess for me with all the stuff that’s going on in the world I just, I’ve never tolerated that. I’ve never felt that you know that in a role of power … you should ever take advantage of that role,” Frassinelli said.
She continued and said it might be easy to get lost in a moment, but that coaches have to remember there is life after sport.
“You have to stick by knowing that these are individuals you’re trying to make better people so that when they leave here, they might not be an Olympic athlete, but they’re going to be a good person,” she said.
Frassinelli recognizes that conversations between athletes and coaches will not always be pleasant, like after a game when a player has made a mistake.
“That’s where we encourage them to come talk to us,” she said. “And I know it’s hard for them sometimes but we’re going to give the honest answer whether you like the answer or not. But we’re going to try to communicate it.”
The line between being a tough coach and an abusive one is sometimes blurry, according to Frassinelli. Avoiding it totally may be impossible, but the important part is the way potentially abusive behavior is managed, she said. Coaches, athletes and administrations must build enough trust to do that.
“I think about how often is there oversight, how often are athletic directors or even associate ADs watching the interactions that are happening with their coaching staff and their student athletes just to check, just to make sure,” Frassinelli said.
Fraser, Quinnipiac’s SWA, said she believes administrator involvement is vital to understanding the cultures of the programs they oversee.
“I think the role is knowing enough about the programs you’re reading about going into the survey, so that most of what is said isn’t a surprise,” she said. “So if you’re doing your job [as an administrator] there shouldn’t be too many things there that you had no idea about because you’re close enough to the coaches, you’re close enough to the student athletes, you’re close enough to the program from just being around.”
However, Quinnipiac counselor Mary Pellitteri believes trust may be the wrong word to use when trying to avoid abusive behavior.
“Take trust and throw it right out the window,”Pellitteri said. “That’s a word that is way overused in my opinion because it’s something that has to be earned.”
Pellitteri said athletes need to not only get to know their coaches, but also get over the possible embarrassment of speaking up if they feel wronged.
“We feel like, ‘oh don’t be such a fuddy duddy’ or whatever, and that’s when it gets more and more uncomfortable,” she said. “So I think it’s more about trusting yourself to be able to stand up for things.”
However, as an athlete who has witnessed this behavior, Connery believes athletes sticking up for themselves can be a double-edged sword.
“They’re a wuss if they [admit it bothers them] and then people pull the whole ‘if you’re at a high level, if you’re a D1 athlete you need to be able to handle this,’” she said.
NCAA surveys mirror Connery’s thoughts.
In the most recent Growth, Opportunities, Aspirations and Learning of Students in college or GOALS survey, about half of female respondents said they were “very comfortable” going to their captains with team problems. The percentage increased from freshmen to seniors.
However, when asked how comfortable they were talking to coaches about team problems, a higher percentage of student athletes selected “somewhat comfortable” or “somewhat uncomfortable.”
When asked how comfortable they would be talking with administrators about problems on a team, over half were “somewhat uncomfortable” or “very uncomfortable” across all years.
It was Connery’s captain, Morgan Fritz-Ward who faced discomfort and requested a meeting with administration. She and her team decided they were not going to let any more athletes suffer from their coach’s behaviors.
And once Seeley was gone, Connery, in her senior season found her love for hockey again.
“The coaches let me be a little more like, free, the way that I am,” said Connery. “And all the love poured in again.”
While the new head ice hockey coach and assistant under Seeley, Cassandra Turner, was not someone the players felt like they could go to in their time of suffering, Connery found a way to enjoy her senior season.
“In order for you to do better you have to forgive,” Connery said. “She’s very good at communicating with people … She’s very good at understanding people’s minds. I trusted that she could do well, could teach us well, could be a good coach and everything.”
MacDonough, the Quinnipiac trainer and mental health liaison, said that it’s important for coaches to have a healthy line of communication between them and their athletes and to not let too many personal feelings get in the way.
“We have a duty to check those behaviors, check our emotions at the door. If our student athlete isn’t performing well I do think that we have to hold them accountable and say ‘hey you’re slipping, what’s going on,’” she said.
So while student athletes can sometimes feel like no one is listening, experts say there is a way of managing problems between athletes and coaches. Abuse in women’s sports can be avoided with communication, accountability, respect and self esteem.
From Connery’s point of view, “you’ve gotta really value yourself … and know what you deserve and the kind of way you should be treated … put that value up higher.”
Reporter’s note: In the interest of full disclosure, Grace Manthey is a student athlete at Quinnipiac on the Acrobatics and Tumbling team.
Toys R Us is closing its doors nationwide. While local students are disappointed about losing the experience taking a trip to the toy store, they understand the change in today’s toy culture has contributed to the close.
“I think it’s kind of sad,” said Pat Pitts, a junior journalism major at Quinnipiac. “Everything they [kids today] want is on electronics or something like that, so they don’t have that toy experience that you and I had growing up.”
In its long history, Toys R Us has emerged as an important part of the childhoods of Quinnipiac students. Ben Kuru, a freshman marketing major at Quinnipiac even had a specific memorable experience.
“My favorite thing there was a bike that I got to ride around there a little bit,” said Kuru. “The workers there were really friendly and it’s unfortunate that the place is closing down.”
Over the past year, Toys R Us has faced a series of financial miscues that have led to the company’s downfall.
On September 18th the company declared bankruptcy after being over $5 billion dollars in debt. Four months later the company announced that it would be closing over 100 stores across the country.
By March Toys R Us announced its liquidation, leading to the closure of over 700 nationwide locations.
While debt is arguably the biggest contributor to the company’s demise, some saw different reasons for Toys R Us’s decline.
“I noticed that their video game section wasn’t that drastic,” said Shannon Marmot, a junior public relations major at Quinnipiac. “They tried to base it more on board games and I feel like that was a huge downside to them.”
Others saw issues with the pricing of the items in the store.
Kuru said he thought prices at Toys R Us were “a little bit out there,” but it’s not the only reason he thought the toy store failed.
“Kids are more into technology than they are into physical toys nowadays,” said Kuru.
Lori Hershman, an employee at Evan’s Toy Shoppe in Hamden, Connecticut, had similar feelings on children’s shift towards technology.
“I see in restaurants that they’re playing with iPads instead of coloring books,” said Hershman. “In cars, they’re watching movies or playing games instead of looking out the window.”
Amy Cavallo, a sophomore finance major at Quinnipiac, said there could have been a way to save the store.
“If debt was truly the issue…I think at that point you really need to refocus your business practice on repaying,” said Cavallo. “You could’ve invested that [money] into repaying your loans.”
With the end of the Toys R Us in sight, Hershman is concerned that the absence of the company could have a negative effect on children.
“If there isn’t a toy store and they couldn’t get what they want, that would be detrimental. It’s important for kids to have that experience of saving their pennies and getting that toy they’ve wanted,” said Hershman.
Toys R Us has commenced liquidation sales in all of it’s nationwide locations. The company is anticipated to run out of money by May.
Quinnipiac University’s School of Law held its 2018 Symposium at its ceremonial courtroom on the North Haven Campus on Friday. The school titled the event, “Psychiatric and Epigenetic, Legal, and Public Health Challenges Facing Refugee Children: An Integrated Approach.”
The 2018 Quinnipiac University Law School Symposium at the ceremonial courtroom at Quinnipiac’s North Haven Campus.
The symposium not only included speakers from Quinnipiac, but also Brown University, Yale University and Integrated Refugee and Immigration Services.
Quinnipiac law and medicine professor W. John Thomas and his colleagues want the Symposium “to initiate a world-wide conversation about the potentially multi-generational consequences of failing to serve the needs of refugee children,” said Thomas.
An audience of about fifty people attended the symposium.
The presenters led the attendees through the history of the laws pertaining to international refugees. They explained that current laws relating to international refugees were based off of World War II white European international refugees, as opposed to non-western groups that make up the majority of international refugees today. Professor Thomas said how drastically different the Trump administration’s refugee policy is compared to past administrations.
“In 2016 we had a limit of 110,000 refugees and according to some actors around the world that was sufficient enough to fulfill our moral obligation and obligation as fellow human beings,” Thomas said.
But according to Thomas, the Trump administration announced a new maximum of only 45,000.
Thomas also said the United States had a moral responsibility for creating some of the refugee crises that exist today.
Quinnipiac law and medicine professor W. John Thomas explaining the US’s moral responsibilities.
Similarly, Quinnipiac law professor Sheila Hayre discussed the complex issues surrounding immigration and refugee laws. She explained the legal definition of someone who should receive refugee status, as well legal terms associated with refugees.
Here is a video of Professor Hayre explaining the legal definition of someone who should receive refugee status.
Hayre explaining the differences between Asylum Seekers and Refugees.
After a short lunch break the second half of the Symposium began with Brown University senior neuroscience student Caleb Brown. He talked about epigenetics, which is the idea that gene expression can be altered by personal experience.
Brown University senior neuroscience student Caleb Brown explaining the relationship between epigenetics and the refugee experience.
“If you have these very drastic effects in your genome because of extreme exposure to stress this can also be seen in your progeny,” Brown said.
He also explained refugees could be particularly influenced.
“The extent to which that actually effects how they react to every day life is still being tested, but there are some implications that could effect how your progeny interacts with stressful environments,” Brown said.
Thomas, whose last two books have been oral history projects, said he thinks that presenting information about refugees in an engaging way is an important tool to help educate people. But it’s specifically the stories about people that have the greatest effect.
“I have come to believe that personal narratives are most effective in honestly and accurately presenting information in a form that draws in the viewer/reader/listener,” Thomas said. “I urge journalists to seek out personal narratives of refugees to use a stage from which to report their plight.”
Thomas and his colleagues have already presented their findings about the challenges facing refugee children in Washington, D.C. and Spain. He has also recruited several experts in relevant fields to write chapters in what will be an edited book about the challenges facing refugee children. Thomas and his colleagues plan to present their findings this summer in Prague and Japan.
Experts are trying to figure out how to support Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals recipients in the wake of President Trump’s passed March 5 deadline for DACA, according to Maria Praeli, Quinnipiac University alumna and immigration policy associate at FWD.us, a bipartisan organization with a hand in commonsense immigration reform and criminal justice reform advocacy.
The Obama Administration established DACA in 2012. It granted undocumented immigrants who came to the United States as minors with a temporary and renewable two-year work permit and protections from deportation, according to informedimmigrant.com.
But President Trump put the program in jeopardy in September. He announced a March 5 deadline, after which no one can renew or or submit an application.
A week before the the Trump Administration’s deadline the Supreme Court announced they would not hear a California case concerning the integrity of the DACA program. As a result, the case returned to the ninth circuit. The court ordered an injunction that made the deadline obsolete. While it didn’t create a solution, Praeli described the injunction as a “small victory.”
Timeline by Thamar Bailey
“What the court petition did was that out of a California injunction say that the way in which the Trump administration ended the program wasn’t right and therefore the administration had to accept renewal applications,” Praeli said. “But what it did not do was say that the administration had to accept new applications.”
FWD.us is currently working on is assisting businesses and universities to support their DACA recipients.
“It’s someone’s well being being turned upside down, but it’s also people within their communities, their circle that’s affected by this,” Praeli said. “So if you’re an employee your employer is now losing someone and that’s [a] cost to business. If you’re a teacher at a university you would be potentially losing a student.”
Several universities have showed their support for DACA recipients by paying for legal fees associated with applying for and renewing DACA permits as well as offering scholarships.
More than 700 college and universities signed on to the Pomona College statement, symbolic of their support for DACA students, otherwise known as DREAMers, stating their refusal to share information on DACA students and refusing to use campus enforcement for deportation.
Quinnipiac University was not one of those universities, according to Executive Vice President and Provost Mark Thompson.
“The concern that the president had with signing on to the [Panoma statement] was about the potential political backlash against those institutions that were signing on to that agreement,” Thompson said. “So he didn’t want to position our students who are DREAMers to potentially in any way be impacted by any backlash that would come from the federal government.”
While Quinnipiac didn’t officially sign the Panoma statement, Thompson said the university follows the same sentiment. In an email addressed to the Quinnipiac community on Sept. 6, 2017, Thompson reaffirmed the universities commitment to diversity and inclusion.
“DACA students are an integral part of our community,” Thompson wrote. “The university does not share private information about our students in accordance with the Family Educational and Rights of Privacy Act (FERPA). While the university is bound to comply with state and federal laws, enforcement of federal immigration policy primarily rests with federal authorities.”
Praeli, who graduated in 2016, believes the university could have firmer policies. During her time at the university she noted she had great professors, but lacked a sense of community. Instead, she had to make her own network of professors and faculty members to support herself.
According to Thompson, the Quinnipiac Department of Multicultural and Global Education would’ve been in charge of facilitating such a network and community. He added that he believes this is something the university ought to do if it’s not being done already.
Community is only one issue of various academic barriers that DREAMers have to face, Praeli said.
In Connecticut prior to 2011, even if a student had lived in the state their whole life they wouldn’t be eligible to pay in-state tuition. It wasn’t until Governor Malloy signedAn Act Concerning Access to Postsecondary Education in July 2011, that undocumented immigrants who met the criteria were eligible for in-state tuition.
Praeli also explained that DREAMers are not privy to financial aid and state funding in the forms of grants and loans, which is why various private institutions have created scholarships for DREAMers.
Quinnipiac doesn’t offer any scholarships specifically designated for DREAMers, according to Dominic Yoia, the university director of financial aid. However, Yoia said all students are considered for academic scholarship, regardless of their U.S. citizenship status.
While there’s no official count of the number of DACA students attending Quinnipiac, Thompson suspects the number is relatively low.
However, executive director of the Albert Schweitzer Institute and political science professor Sean Duffy said regardless of the number of DACA students, the university should provide better assistance for them, especially because there’s a reality that many of Quinnipiac students have mixed-status or undocumented families while they are citizens themselves.
“It would be nice if our university actually had more than just to say ‘oh if you’re concerned about this then go to the office of multiculturalism and global education and they’ll be able to refer you to some resources in the community that may be able to help,’” Duffy said. “That’s really a kind of weak kind of support in my mind.”
The department of multicultural and global education was unavailable for comment for this story.
The York Hill campus, courtesy of Quinnipiac’s website
By Tatyana Youssef
As Quinnipiac reaches its goal of 7,000 undergraduate students, the student body is experiencing changes in the traditional housing structure. More students are being fit into the 15 different residential areas on York Hill and Mount Carmel campus, while many others are living in off-campus options such as Quinnipiac owned houses or apartments. “Approximately 4,800 students live in university-owned housing in traditional residence halls, suites, apartments and off-campus houses,” according to the university’s website.” With housing selection approaching, students are making decisions with the limited options and new changes.
In early 2017, Quinnipiac announced a variety of changes to the housing structure aimed at reducing the crowding being experienced in some dorms due to the increasing size of incoming classes. There is no longer enough room for all sophomores and freshmen to live on Mount Carmel campus, which is within walking distance of classes.
Current senior and Vice President of the Student Government Association Jacqueline Schmedel has seen drastic changes in housing since she began her experience at Quinnipiac. She says, “I have seen freshmen packed into common rooms, students temporarily displaced due to combusting generators, and underclassmen being sent up to York Hill because there isn’t enough space on campus to accommodate them.”
Good thing Quinnipiac ran out of Housing for over 100 sophomores…… Including myself
Some sophomores are currently living on York Hill, a campus originally intended for upperclassmen. While the university’s website states, “The Crescent and Westview residence hall is one of our newest residence halls, providing housing for upperclassmen,” this does not hold true for the many sophomores living in Crescent dorms.
Alongside freshman dorms of Commons, Ledges, Mountainview, Irma, Dana and Larson, the rise in populations opened up Judge Philip Troup Hall, a former sophomore housing option, as a freshman dorm.
Junior options expanded on York Hill as the former senior dorm, Townhouses, now houses six juniors each. Whitney Village, a living option off campus in a condominium style is now open for juniors.
For many students, living on campus is seen as a privilege entering their first two years at Quinnipiac. When news broke of the sophomore separation, students were disappointed and feared losing their sense of community tied to the Mount Carmel campus. Whitney Leyland, a sophomore psychology major, recalls what her peers say about the York experience. “I haven’t heard of it being stressful on York. Some of my friends actually really like it.”
Charlotte Gardner, a sophomore journalism major, was nervous to find out her higher lottery number left her with a crescent room option on York Hill last spring semester. This year, she is satisfied with the experience, “I love living on York. I’m so much more relaxed and calm and not as anxious as I am when I’m on Main (Mount Carmel campus)- it really feels like I’m coming home as opposed to a dorm.”
Students have expressed frustration with the random “lottery system” through which housing numbers are assigned. Freshman health science major Gisselle Acevedo vocalizes her annoyance with the current housing process, describing the experience as “too competitive.” She questions the temporary solutions combatting the influx of incoming students accepted this year. “I don’t like how for most of the good rooms it’s seven people. What is the point of a forced triple? Why not make rooms with 8 people and have equal space?”
Whitney Leyland, currently living in Sahlin on the Mount Carmel campus, understands the temporary solutions but sees what makes it so complicated for the students new to the process. “The whole lottery system is chaotic because after people start to get their housing situations set up, people have to get kicked out to fit other styles.” In an ideal world, she believes having the same number of students in each room allows the housing selection process to run smoother. “Having the same amount live together would alleviate the stress of the possibility of getting kicked out and everyone would know how many they needed to fill the room.”
One administrator proposed a different idea when approaching the random lottery housing process. Erin Twomey Provistalis, Assistant Director of Student Affairs, says “I think there should be a way for students who get a certain GPA, are involved outside the classroom, pay their bills on-time, etc. get preference in the lottery.” With the unfairness that stems from random lottery, Twomey would “love to see a system that rewards our students who are really making an impact at Quinnipiac.”
When it was being constructed in 2010, the York Hill campus was originally approved to have several more dorms in addition to the ones that were built. While these dorms were never constructed, President Lahey revealed in Fall of 2017 that Quinnipiac was beginning the process of applying for permits to begin constructing a new 220-room dorm on the York Hill Campus. The addition of this new building could alleviate much of the stress experienced during the housing process by giving students more modern and attractive options.
Quinnipiac vs. Yale on Feb. 9 in New Haven, (Photo by Steve Musco/Yale Athletics)
By Cliff Nadel
The ninth-seeded Quinnipiac University men’s hockey team will make the short trip down Whitney Avenue to New Haven to face its rival, No. 8 seed Yale, at 7 p.m., Friday night at Ingalls Rink.
It is the first game of a best-of-three series in the first round of the East Coast Athletic Conference men’s hockey championship tournament.
The last time Quinnipiac and Yale faced off in the postseason was in the 2013 NCAA national championship game in Pittsburgh, where the Bulldogs won, 4-0.
The Bobcats hold a 17-7-5 advantage all-time over Yale, and are 16-2 in ECAC first-round games having never lost an opening series.
You can watch game one here, or listen to the game here.
