Exercise examines ‘regional response’

Local and state emergency personnel aid in on-campus test

By Katie Bresnahan

While most of the campus community was off campus and on spring break last Thursday, UMass Dartmouth hosted an emergency exercise that involved police, fire fighters and other emergency personnel from around Southeastern Massachusetts.

This test, which took place mainly on the first floor of the Dion building, included “about 100 police officers, fire fighters and emergency medical [personnel],” said University Spokesperson John Hoey. Campus, local and state police all took part in the exercise.

Hoey said that the purpose of the exercise was to “help us train for a major emergency.” It also demonstrated the ability of a variety of agencies to work together to stop an emergency and the communication between the different groups.

“The premise of the exercise was an active shooter on campus,” explained Colonel Emil Fioravanti, UMass Dartmouth’s Director of Public Safety. He mentioned that similar exercises were held in three other places around Massachusetts, but this was the only one to take place on a college campus.

When asked if UMass Dartmouth’s role in this program was a response to the massacre at Virginia Tech last April, Fioravanti said that it was, in part. He added that this kind of testing is a “practical response” to disasters such as the shootings at Virginia Tech. vAccording to Fioravanti, the purpose of this exercise was “to test regional response, should an incident like this ever happen on campus” or anywhere else in Southeastern Massachusetts. vHoey said, “Everyone was very pleased with how the agencies [worked together].” He described the experience as a learning opportunity that required responses across Southeastern Massachusetts.

Over the next couple weeks, Hoey says that the agencies involved will go back and examine all the responses in detail. The communication between the agencies will be looked at as well.

After the exercise, Fioravanti said, “We were very pleased with the results.” He added, “[There was] nothing that we can’t fix or that we haven’t fixed already.”

UMass Dartmouth will also be implementing two new safety measures in the next few months. First, Hoey said, the university will establish an “instant messaging system” that will allow UMD to contact students in times of emergency by sending text messages to their cell phones.

Hoey also said that by next fall the university will develop a campus-wide signaling system. This system will be comprised of a siren that the school will sound off when there is an on-campus emergency. It will notify everyone on campus to check their UMD e-mail or the university website to see what is happening.

Students can expect tuition raise in ‘08-‘09

On Wednesday, March 19, the UMass Board of Trustees met in UMass Dartmouth’s own Woodland Commons building for an exciting and somewhat controversial meeting. Aside from our own Student Senate enjoying the passing of a new and revised constitution, there was the annually disputable issue of a fee increase for the UMass system, this year, a 3.1 percent hike.

The Board of Trustees approved this fee increase. This is the fifth year in a row that the tuition and fee increases have been under the rate of inflation and well under the increases that are expected from other public colleges and universities. For the past five years, the average fee increase in other colleges and universities has been 7 percent; however, at UMass it has only been 3.4 percent. What this means to us: A UMass education is still the best deal around, offering remarkable educational opportunities at a relatively modest cost.

The actual increase in fees will add between $266 and $311 to a UMass Student bill. The total cost for tuition and fees for an in state UMass Dartmouth student will be $8,858; with room and board the cost will be $18,286.

Twenty percent of this increase will go directly into financial aid and UMass Dartmouth will continue to meet 91 percent of its need based financial aid. The system, overall, has increased financial aid from $35 million in the 2003 fiscal year to $85 million in the 2008 fiscal year.

Without this increase, UMass would have been faced with the prospect of cutting classes, programs and services. Approving this increase was a difficult, but necessary decision in order to maintain the high quality of education for the UMass system. It is still an exceptional educational value!

Tamara Endich
Student Trustee

Resident students have new options with ‘thematic housing’

By Stephanie Luz

UMass Dartmouth students will have more options in the room selection process for the 2008-2009 academic year with new themed housing and the elimination of “twenty-one plus apartments.”

“I am happy that housing is offering more advantages for students to live on campus.  Thematic housing allows you to live based on your specific preferences, which is great for students. With this style of housing, we can accomodate more students pertaining to their needs,” said Nick Prizio, president of the UMass Dartmouth Residence Hall Council.

Thematic housing will be located in sections of four different residential areas: one first-year hall, Roberts; one sophomore hall, Pine Dale; one Woodland apartment, Evergreen and townhouse living, Cedar Dell West. Roberts, Pine Dale, and Evergreen will provide sections within the building for quiet and substance awareness themes while Cedar Dell West will have sections of graduate living space and 12-month housing.

There are some students who are skeptical of the new plans. Student Trustee, Tamara Endich says, “There are already current situations within housing such as security and RA accountability that need to be dealt with. Adding a new kind of housing structure could just make the conditions we’re dealing with more problematic.”

For students interested in quiet housing, quiet hours will be in place from Sunday to Thursday for twenty-four hours a day and this theme will prioritize quiet pursuits. Friday and Saturday will observe some “non-quiet” hours according to the Office of Housing and Residential Life (OHRL) website. Shelly Scott, Associate Director of Residential Life, explained, “[Quiet housing] will be more quiet than your average residential experience.”

Scott reports that the decisions of the Room Selection Committee (RSC), comprised of students and housing officials made these new changes.

Substance awareness housing will also be offered in quiet housing buildings. This is a housing option where residents of all ages choose not to consume alcohol and of course, not to use illicit drugs.

“It’s not substance free living, it’s substance awareness because many in recovery are smokers, and while smoking is not allowed in any University building, this may still be a choice of some residents of this area when outside,” Scott said.

She continued, “The important thing to note about people choosing this type of thematic housing is the different reasons that this is important to them.”

“Some students are coming from families where substance abuse is a problem, some students individually are recovering from substance abuse,” Scott notes, “and some students have been adversely affected by substance abuse and are substance free themselves. “

“There are a lot of different people that could be interested,” said Scott.

“Substance Awareness housing will most likely be located near quiet housing. The theory is that although substance awareness people are not necessarily quiet, they’re selecting their housing with a purpose and a specific theme in mind, [so they] will be more respectful of the other themes,” said Scott.

Cedar Dell West has been chosen to accommodate graduate and 12-month housing. After undergoing major renovations during the summer, graduate students will finally have a place to call “home.” Scott mentioned, “[Graduate students] want independent living. The Cedar Dell is the closest thing to living off campus.”

Scott said that graduate students can still move into the apartments, however many students want a separate graduate experience. RSC feels that Cedar Dell West will be conducive to reaching this goal.

Twelve-month housing, also located at Cedar Dell West, will house students who wish to live on campus during all academic breaks at a discount. As explained on the OHRL website, the cost for living on campus for a full twelve month period is currently $10,050. Students living in twelve-month housing will receive a forty percent discount off all breaks, bringing the fee down to $8,707.

In order to get themed housing, students must fill out a thematic housing application and submit it before Friday, March 28. These forms are available from OHRL staff or can be printed off the OHRL website. Students who have submitted their thematic housing applications before the deadline will be given the opportunity to take part in a special online room selection for just those areas from Monday, April 14 to Wednesday, April 16.

General online room selection will take place Tuesday, April 22 through Friday, May 2. There will be an online podcast available to show resident students how to participate in online room selection.

Finally, twenty-one plus housing will be history next semester. Students will be eligible to choose the room or apartment of their liking regardless of their age. RSC felt that twenty-one plus housing was very limiting because it made the room selection process more difficult for students to choose the right place.

Scott said, “We never had the exact right number of offerings available. So, at the last minute some of the designations had to be changed.”

Scott questioned, “Is it worth having hallways or a building all twenty-one plus for the convenience of knowing the age of an entire apartment?” She added, “[Room selection] should be more convenient for the students, not the RA staff or Public Safety.”

Depending on the success of thematic housing, the new themes will either be expanded or removed. For more information about thematic housing, refer to the OHRL website at http://www.umassd.edu/housing/.