Rain-out still poses threat for festivities

Due to weather problems, Temple’s annual Spring Fling, organized by Main Campus Program Board, has been postponed until tomorrow.

MCPB President Tiffany Thompson said it is up to the administration when Spring Fling is held.

“MCPB does not actually decide when and why it’s canceled or postponed. The administration gets to decide that,” said Thompson, a senior kinesiology major.

Though the official date of Spring Fling was postponed, many events still occurred.

“A lot of other things go on, just the date of Spring Fling itself was postponed until the following Wednesday,” Thompson said.

Weather services have predicted scattered showers for Wednesday, as well. Thompson said MCPB is not sure what it will do if it rains again. A backup plan has not been established yet.

“That has yet to be determined,” she said. “Once we know, we’ll certainly let the student body know.”

Many students were unsure why Spring Fling was pushed back an entire week instead of moved to last Thursday or Friday.

“I’m not sure why it’s on another Wednesday instead of [on Thursday],” said freshman business major Alexis Canary.
She said she was disappointed Spring Fling was not on April 15 because she made other plans the following Wednesday.

“It’s harder for the Temple Police to actually control the campus,” Thompson said, explaining why the administration does not want to hold Spring Fling close to the weekend.

Due to the large volume of people, Thompson said things are less likely to get out of hand if the event is during the week.

“The administration is not fond of it being on a Thursday or Friday,” she said. “It’s harder for the Temple Police to really handle the campus because there will be such a large amount of people there. They’d rather have it on a Wednesday.”

Thompson said it is very unlikely Spring Fling will be held on a Thursday again, but Temple has held it on Thursdays before.

“My freshman year, [Spring Fling] was on a Thursday. I know the Temple Police had a lot of issues with underage-drinking. A lot more than if it was held on the previous day,” Thompson said.

Regardless of the date change, the itinerary for Spring Fling will remain the same except for a few minor changes.

“Everything is still the same,” she said. “The only thing we had to change was we had a digital caricaturist and digital T-shirt making, but because of booking flights, we couldn’t switch that to the 22nd, so they actually did come out on the 15th, but we had to move them to the atrium.”

Spring Fling will be on Liacouras Walk from Montgomery Avenue to Norris Street, 13th Street from Montgomery Avenue to Norris Street and Berks Mall from Liacouras Walk to 12th Street, from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. tomorrow.

“No matter what day Spring Fling’s on,” Thompson said, “everyone will have a good time.”

Valerie Rubinsky can be reached at valerie.rubinsky@temple.edu.

Spring Fling band lineup

While Spring Fling has been rained out this week and postponed, hopefully next week will bring some nicer weather, more ideal for listening to some live music under the Bell Tower. Once again, Temple’s annual festival will host some notable musical performances.

The stage located in front of the Bell Tower will showcase its first act around 11am on Wednesday with the Temple Singer/Songwriters and Musicians group, followed by Philly’s very own indie/experimental act The Infinien Band.

“We’re excited to be outside rather than some smokey bar or club,” said The Infinien Band’s guitarist Matt Hollenberg.

Other Temple students performing include The Temple Gospel Ministries, The Juggling Club and Latin Ballroom Dancing. Also performing is Mount Holly New Jersey’s horn driven punk outfit Case of the Mondays. If you’re looking to find your classic rock and blues fix, Nazareth, PA’s Wailing Waters will undoubtedly quench your craving for some anti-scene music.

On the verge of releasing their new EP, This is Now, Lancaster’s The Right Coast will close out the Bell Tower stage.

“We’re going to be playing all of the songs from our new record, including a cover of ‘Love Story,’ a Taylor Swift song,” said guitarist Patrick Hatt.

With sounds reminiscent of The All American Rejects and All Time Low, The Right Coast should definitely make your to-do list this Wednesday at Spring Fling.

Here’s the full schedule:

11:00 Sound Check
11:10 Temple Singer/Songwriters and Musicians
11:15 Associacion de Estudiantes Latinos
11:30 The Infinien Band
12:20 Temple Gospel Ministries
12:30 Case of the Mondays
1:20 Mudslingers
1:45 Wailing Waters
2:35 Temple Juggling Club
2:45 Latin Ballroom Dance
3:00 The Right Coast

Phillies’ World Series trophy to appear on campus

As the world-champion Philadelphia Phillies train for their upcoming season, their 2-foot tall trophy will make a stop at Temple.

The World Series trophy, which the Phillies snatched after winning last October’s historic game against the Tampa Bay Rays, will be on display at the Bell Tower March 24.

The event, which will feature other attractions such as appearances from the Phillies Ballgirls and giveaways, is part of annual College Spring Fling Week, when the franchise travels to local colleges to help promote the Phillies’ upcoming season.

Jillian Ashton, a season and group sales representative intern for the Phillies, said the College Spring Fling Week will run from March 23 to 27 and will include visits to six local colleges during the five-day span.

“This year, as an added incentive, we are bringing the World Series trophy along for our Spring Fling Week as part of the World Series Trophy Tour,” said Ashton, who graduated from Temple in August with a degree in sport and recreation management.

Although the promotional event will mostly be centered on the trophy, there will be plenty of other activities in which students can take part. Free photo ops with the Phillies Ballgirls and the trophy will be available for the duration of the event. A prize wheel will be available for students to try their luck as well.

For fanatical Phillies fans, event coordinators will distribute rally towels while supplies last.

In addition to the activities, the 2008 Phillies Video Yearbook, The Perfect Season will be for sale.

“Students are the primary target for this tour because we are trying to get all of the local colleges excited about the upcoming Phillies season,” Ashton said.

The World Series trophy, which the Phillies clinched in a 4-3 win over the Rays in Game 5, has been on a national tour since January.

Craig Solomon, who works in marketing in the Philadelphia Phillies organization and graduated from Temple last year with a degree in sport and recreation management, was designated to be the official trophy keeper. So far, he has made more than 100 appearances and traveled more than 10,000 miles while showcasing the trophy.

He says he does not permit anyone to touch the sterling silver trophy.

“The tour is an intimate time with the trophy. After the tour, the trophy may be found sitting on a podium under glass, meaning people can’t even breathe on it. But during its tour, there is no glass cover and people can get extremely close,” Solomon said.

The event will be held at Bell Tower from 11:30 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. next Tuesday. In case of inclement weather, it will be relocated in the Student Center Atrium.

The trophy will travel to Saint Joseph’s University and the University of Pennsylvania following its visit.

Sergei Blair can be reached at sergei.blair@temple.edu.

Recycling rocks Earth Day

This year’s Spring Fling was a sea of green: recycling boxes on almost every corner, recycled plastic Frisbee giveaways, and student organizations tying environmental issues into their activities throughout the day. Green awareness was everywhere.

One of the main reasons for this “green” theme for Spring Fling was because of a recent emphasis on recycling on campus. This semester was the first time that outdoor recycling bins on campus existed. And some say they were long overdue.

Without Temple’s recycling department, campus may not have recycling available to students at all.

“The recycling office oversees all recycling on campus, does research and organizes all recycling projects,” said Rita Burns, a sophomore environmental studies major and employee of the recycling department. “We oversaw all recycling during Spring Fling, too.”

The head of the recycling department, Marshall Budin, has taken it upon himself to handle all recycling on campus with the help of just four student-workers and is still trying to convince the university that students want more recycling.

“He’s basically a one-man show,” said Matt Himmelein, a senior environmental policy major and president of Students for Environmental Action. “He definitely does all that he can to expand and come up with new ideas for recycling on campus.”

Luckily for Budin, SEA attempts to coordinate with the recycling office as often as possible to raise awareness about recycling.

“We just had our ‘Bury the Bell Tower’ event, which was sponsored by the SEA and the recycling office,” Himmelein said. “It was the first time we had a big outdoor event to raise awareness about recycling on campus. We went trash can-diving and took recyclables out of trash cans all around campus. Then we piled up all the recyclables at the Bell Tower and put a sign on it that said, ‘Shame on you!’”

While the event showed that students were using the outdoor recycling bins, the outcome of the event just wasn’t specific enough. The trash in the parts of campus without recycling was filled with recyclable items.

“It was, like, 200 pounds of recycling in the first four hours of a Monday,” Himmelein said. “So you could only imagine what it’s like on a Thursday afternoon.”

Part of the reason why more students don’t recycle is because it’s not as easily accessible as some would like it to be. The new outdoor recycling bins are only located at some hotspots on campus, rather than every few feet like campus trash cans.

“Almost every day, I’m getting people that are saying, ‘Why don’t we have recycling at the Bell Tower? Why don’t we have paper recycling outside?’” Himmelein said. “The students want this. The planet needs this.”

The recycling center has a simple answer to these questions, and it is indeed a sad truth.

“It comes down to money,” Burns said. “How many outdoor recycling bins would we get? Who would empty them?”

Since the recycling department is so small, Temple’s bureaucracy doesn’t yet recognize recycling as a need for the university and the environment. However, many students are passionate about recycling, and are sure to be vocal about it.

“We recycle in our apartment, and if I don’t recycle, Ann is sure to yell at me,” said Courtney Clarahan, a sophomore tourism and hospitality major.

Clarahan’s roommate, Ann Cerruti, calls herself environmentally conscious, especially with recycling.

“Not having recycling in apartments around campus should be illegal,” the sophomore actuarial science major said.

Clarahan and Cerruti live in Temple Towers and are sure to use the recycling outlets, but said it isn’t as easy as it should be to recycle there.

“They could definitely be bigger,” Clarahan said. “They have some lids where you can only put something through the little opening, so when it gets full, it overflows through the top.”

As far as opening eyes around campus about recycling, Spring Fling was a success. However, it is up to the students to end their apathy for good and do whatever it takes to be good to the environment.

“I think the awareness part of Spring Fling is still working,” Himmelein said. “But too many people on campus just don’t know how their little bit that they give back actually makes a huge difference.”

Carlene Majorino can be reached at c.majorino@temple.edu.

Spring Fling 2008: Slideshow

Main Campus’ 2008 Spring Fling was held on Tuesday, April 15.

‘Fling’ to duplicate success

Spring Fling has been a Temple tradition for three decades. Upperclassmen can’t wait, freshman tingle with anticipation and teachers shrug their shoulders when most of their students don’t show up to class.

The tradition comes down to planning. After 30 years, Student Activities, Main Campus Program Board, Facilities Management and Campus Safety Services all feel as though they’ve got it down to a T.

“We have a good system,” said Christopher Carey, Student Activities program coordinator. “Sometimes there are constraints, but … because it’s tradition, people look forward to it. It promotes itself.”

On April 7, after all vendor applications were received, staff from all participating offices met to discuss their responsibilities. Few things are changed each year, which makes the process easier.

Student Activities receives applications from vendors, student organizations and Temple departments. They are also responsible for booking the live music.

“It’s typically the same vendors every year,” Carey said. “Once a vendor does the event, they usually like it. At this point, we don’t recruit ourselves.”

One difference this year is the amount of involvement by MCPB, which helped decide this year’s green theme.
“This year we evolved to include more students,” Carey said.

Along with Students for Environmental Action, MCPB helped get the word out to vendors on ways to incorporate the theme.

Campus Police are also an important part of Spring Fling because so many people, both Temple students and others, are on campus.

“We see deployment as the best way on campus to prevent problems,” said Charles Leone, deputy director of Campus Safety Services.
Prior to and during Spring Fling, Campus Police perform more random bag checks at Temple’s residence halls. On the day of Spring Fling, the campus is broken into four quadrants for easier monitoring, more officers are put on bike patrol and campus cameras are monitored more heavily.

All of these are preventive measures, and police pay careful attention to areas on campus that draw large crowds. Later in the day, police monitor houses that are having parties, in case a of a complaint or behavior problems.

Campus Police have learned their lessons over the years, though there haven’t been many problems in the last several years, Leone said. More problems occurred more than 10 years ago.

“I have to give the students credit. They’ve been really responsive,” Leone said. “We don’t get a lot of celebratory violence like we used to. Maybe it’s a sign of the times.”

Morgan Ashenfelter can be reached at morgan.a@temple.edu.

Spring Fling goes green

Spring Fling is finally here, and this year’s theme may be the most memorable yet.

With all of the environmental awareness spreading throughout campus, Main Campus Program Board decided on the theme of “Green is more than just a color, it’s a lifestyle.”

“The purpose of Temple University’s Spring Fling going green is to raise environmental awareness throughout the Temple community for the week,” said Rob Tynan, outside activities chair for MCPB. “We want to get the idea of being more environmentally friendly into the minds of people at Temple.”

To complete this mission, MCPB has several initiatives in store this week. These initiatives should make it easier, and a little more fun, for students to “go green.”

To save trees, MCPB and the Student Center used less paper while making flyers and posters to publicize the events. The paper that was used is 100 percent recycled. They also incorporated green tips in the various events taking place this week.

“Our hope is that the people who are attending the events will get it into their minds to be more environmentally friendly because of these tips,” Tynan said. “These tips are easy things that any average person can do.”

Tips include simple tasks such as shutting off the water when you brush your teeth, turning a light switch off when you leave a room and throwing your recyclable materials in to the proper receptacles.

“If people actually process this at their own leisure time, then I feel that the theme would have been successful,” Tynan said. “The point is to get that across.”

While checking out the various vendors today, make sure to also keep an eye out for the free giveaways. The Frisbees, T-shirts and backpacks are not only green in color, but in practice.

“The giveaways for Spring Fling are recyclable material,” Tynan said.

While he understands that using recycled paper is more expensive, he said that there are other ways for organizations to promote their events, such as on the Internet and by word of mouth.

MCPB and Student Center also asked that organizations with tables display something eco-friendly.

“The best example that I can think of is community service,” Tynan said. “There was Philly Cleanup two weekends ago. Any organizations that participated in that would display a poster or something to signify that they had participated and had done actions for the environment.”

MCPB is also trying to get academic departments more involved in their efforts. Tynan sent out an e-mail to all deans and asked them to set aside a time throughout the week when every classroom and office at Temple would turn off one light switch.

“I don’t want to visually disturb anyone,” he said. “But I just feel that by turning off one light switch, it won’t in any way interfere with the whole educational process.”

By participating in this conserving of energy, Tynan hopes that it will constantly remind everyone of the theme.

“They’ll walk into the classroom and notice that there’s a light off,” he said. “Well, there’s a light off because Temple’s going green this Spring Fling and in doing so it is trying to preserve energy.”

The TECH Center will also be “going green” in its own way. During this week, it is using 100 percent recyclable paper for the printers. It will also be displaying green tips on the plasma screens, as well as instructions on how to print using both sides of the paper.
“I think it would be great if they did that and people started taking advantage of it,” Tynan said.

Temple’s Facilities Management department is displaying four hybrid cars today to spread the spirit, and there are more receptacles for your recyclables. There are 50 more reusable recycle containers placed throughout the Bell Tower and Liacouras Walk. Representatives from the City of Philadelphia Recycling Office will also be here to spread the word.

MCPB was first presented with this idea last semester by junior environmental studies major Laura Stein from the sustainability task force.

“Honestly, at first, I really didn’t connect with it because I had never been exposed to stuff like this before,” Tynan said. “As time went on and I talked to her more, it really inspired me to actually get this out there.”

One of the things that MCPB is most excited about is the presence of a giant tree painted on cloth canvas, hanging in the vicinity of the Bell Tower. Painted by John Toffie for the Students for Environmental Action, the tree is comprised of many different colors, which represent different promises to the environment. Students will choose a promise to commit to, and then place their thumb in that color ink and leave their thumbprint on the canvas.

“What we’re hoping is that by the end of the day we have lots of thumbprints on there with all kinds of different colors,” Tynan said.
With all of the great environmental advances happening at Temple this week, Tynan and MCPB Marketing Director Tiffany Thompson said they are not sure if it will last.

“We’re hoping that this will continue for years to come,” Thompson said. “But it’s one step at a time here at Temple.”

“After the week is over, I can’t necessarily say that it’s going to stick,” Tynan said. “It’s pretty much up to the people to keep the awareness going.”

Even if extra recycle bins and green tips don’t remain, Tynan and Thompson said that this year’s theme will have changed the perspectives of students and teachers campus-wide.

“It’s a great thing for not only the program board to show that we as a No. 1-playing organization can go green, but we as a university should go green,” Thompson said. “We hope that people catch on and understand that this is not only a theme for Spring Fling, but it’s a movement throughout the country and also the university as well.”

On a positive note, Thompson said that President Ann Weaver Hart is trying to implement a policy that would require students to print double-sided on paper at all times.

“This is the only theme that we have ever had that makes sense and has impacted not only us, but departments, the dean and the president,” Thompson said. “I hope that this green theme not only stays for this week but for years to come.”

Melanie Menkevich can be reached at Melanie.menkevich@temple.edu.

TSG still waiting for ratification signatures

Temple Student Government still needs 1,250 more signatures in order to ratify the new constitution.

TSG Parliamentarian Jon DeSantis encouraged members to get signatures from their friends and organizations at the Monday meeting. He set up a Web site, www.changefortemple.com, in order to make signing easier. Students only put their TU ID number and their name and then submit their “signature” online.

“Tell your friends and people from your organizations. It takes like five seconds,” DeSantis said.

DeSantis and executives from TSG plan to get 1,500 signatures by April 20.

Bill Bergman, Temple’s vice president of operations, also encouraged student participation when he announced that the National Collegiate Athletics Association will be releasing their report on Temple Athletics today.

The report will appear on the athletics department Web site. Students were asked to make comments. The NCAA researches how the athletic department is governed, how it handles the academic integrity of its students, and the equity it produces.  

The NCAA is responsible for recertifying college athletics every ten years.

“It’s not about winning or losing. It’s about how the university treats their athletics,” Bergman said.

TSG President Juan Galeano informed the General Assembly that applications for the TSG Supreme Court were due yesterday. The Supreme Court acts as the overseeing body to the executive branch and the Senate. The Supreme Court will determine if the Senate and executive branch are doing their jobs.

“It’s a great way to get involved next year. It’s something completely new to Temple,” Galeano said.

MCPB Events Chair Rob Tynan and Student Services Director Gina D’Annunzio  reminded TSG members that Spring Fling is coming soon. Tynan encouraged students to sign up for Penny Wars and the Scribble Dribble basketball game, two events that will occur during Spring Fling this year.

Spring Fling will be on Tuesday, April 15.

Rebecca Hale can be reached at rebecca.hale@temple.edu.