Looking for a campus community
CARSON JEREMA STAFF
As students begin picking themselves up from the frenzied first two weeks of welcome-back celebrations, reality will likely begin to settle in for most as mid-terms and essays become due in just a few short weeks.
For those of us who spend so much time on campus that the funk coming off of us is beginning to resemble the furniture in the fireplace lounge, the back-to-school buzz was more than a little tiring. It isn’t just the noise, or all the people that are tiring, rather it is the atmosphere prevalent among the multitudes that is particularly draining. They have no sense of a campus community.
The U of M is a commuter school, meaning that the vast majority of students drive to and from campus everyday. There are few out-ofprovince students and while there are a significant number of international students, the number is still less than 10 per cent. This is contrasted by pretty much every other university in the country, where if students don’t live on campus they are likely to live close by — the McGill ghetto being the most famous example. These schools, or so I hear, provide a vibrant community ripe with student culture and ideas.
True, there are a number of apartment complexes filled with U of M students and many local residents rent out their basements, but this is far from the norm. Most students, after spending all day at school, head back to the suburbs, many never once engaging in whatever campus community exists during their entire careers as students.
Rather than resembling any sort of collegial atmosphere where students can get together to discuss philosophy, meet for coffee, or get wasted, the U of M is more akin to a shopping mall. Yes, all those things happen. But any given day in University Centre is more likely to feature people rushing about, buying books, consuming stale pizza, heading to class and rushing home.
Campus interaction at the U of M has been reduced to an empty exercise in consumerism. It is a function, like eating bologna or masturbation, necessary and only mildly satisfying.
Maybe it is simply because I live a five-minute walk from school, spend nearly every waking hour on campus — and have for the better part of my tenure at the U of M — but I am disappointed with my experience. Though not all of it. Like all my trips to the mall, every trip to university is not entirely horrible. Every once in a while, like that new CD or book that provides one with an instant of gratification, there are some gems at the U of M. But unfortunately when I look around me for someone to enjoy it with, my fellow shoppers have all gone home.
