Petition Against GA Student Section
I held off on posting this for a while, but now that the petition has gained significant support, I thought I would post it here for any students interested in signing it. As of now it has over 3000 signatures.
I know that many people on here are in favor of the GA seating, but for those who don't, this is a chance to voice your opinion and hope for some form of change. If you are for the GA system, simply ignore this post and do not sign.
In my opinion, I think this could lead to at least a GA by section policy, still giving some level of seniority by credits.
Edit: Forgot to include the link.
https://csg.umich.edu/upetition/p/footballseating/
Also, I understand many of you don't agree, but I think all the negging is a little much. Its a relevant topic and many people are against GA as well.
I don't know about that with the pre-gaming. My MBA buddies seemed to think that getting that one last round in of flip-cup was important enough to be late. I disagreed and left early(establishing seating for the group), but it's a definite thing that if no consequences or even incentives are provided for showing up on time then this is the behavior you get. I like the GA idea, at least it's a step in the right direction.
I still don't get why everyone here is supporting going full GA or assigned seats.
How hard is it to implement MCard swipes to track attendance/on time record.
Combine that with GA seatings in blocks, where MCard record and contributions to the school (whether student is on other athletic teams, glee club, solar car, class standing, credits, volunteer etc, whatever AD deems appropriate) gives you the ability to select a certain block preference at the time you apply for tickets.
Then enforce GA by block. By the time the band takes the field (~20 mins before kickoff?), if a good seating block isn't filled up, then other students can move in and take those seats.
This ensures students who earned their preferred seating block/section won't have to show up 3 hours early to the game, while making sure they arrive at least 20 mins (or whatever cutoff time they set) early for the game to save those seats.
Boom. No line problem. No entitled students who show up late.
And when people consistently shows up late they don't get the ability to choose better blocks/sections/rows as MCard is tracked.
In addition, it rewards students who contribute most to the school, as long as they abide by the rules (arriving 20 minutes early.)
The false dichotomys, generalization, fights and general grumpiness of everyone throughout this whole discussion (going back to the fall when people complained about the students coming late) is ridiculous. Pretty much everyone looks bad. So of course I'm going to add my opinion.
I like General Admission. If I want a good seat, I can choose to wait in line, as long as it takes, and I'll get a seat generally where I want. If my priorities lie elsewhere, such as drinking, studying, hooking up, or whatever, I can do that instead, but then I'll have to live with the consequences. Like most everything else in life, there is a trade off. Nearly everyone complaining about not being able to pregame and get into the seats they feel entitled to are just trying to have their cake and eat it too.
All the conversation about this is way overblown, IMO. It will work itself out, just like at every other school that has GA student sections. It might take a year or two of adjusting, but eventually people will figure out how to time their entrance into the stadium for their desired balance of morning partying and seat. The biggest difficulty will be getting large groups (I'm thinking 5-8 housemates, plus friends, out of towners, significant others, and other hangers-on) to all enter at once so to sit together. Groups will likely be smaller as getting a large group of drunk college students to all decide to walk to the game together is like herding cats.
Finally, it will be interesting to see what the student ticket scalping market is like. As time goes by in the morning, a student ticket is literally worth less and less. People will no longer rely on grabbing a ticket for cheap from some freshman girl puking next to a house on Hoover on her way to the game, just to get in.
There are different gates you line up at that correspond to better seats for upperclassmen. I actually wouldn't be opposed to this.
I don't understand why everyone thinks that the people who were showing up late are going to continue to do so. Prior to GA seating, these people didn't feel they were missing out on anything (it's sad, but true). Now that there's a competition for seats, there's going to be a HUGE polarity reversal. People like being first in line. Not only that, but there's going to tons of cutting in line and saving spots for people who show up just before the gates open.
The people getting screwed are the people like me, who always show up 1h-45min early for every game, but am now going to have to show up 6 hours early and skip tailgating compltely in order to get the same seats I would have gotten under the old policy.
I didn't realize there were bad seats in Michigan Stadium. It's a freaking bowl fergodsakes. I remember going to the Wisconsin game in 1998 and sitting practically on the roof of Crisler Arena [Center], and it being the best day of my then young life. Everyone here is arguing back and forth and I understand both sides, but the fact of the matter is there have been way too many games, meaningful ones at that, where those top 20 rows have been embarrassingly empty. If I were a senior this year I would be just as mad as some of you are, but at some point you have to realize that, as usual, everyone gets punished for a couple people doing not doing the right thing.
...and it won't make one damn bit of difference. As students during finals week, I would think you all would have much better things to do with your time.
A good stadium seating cause would be to double the width of the aisles and have bench seating. They certainly can afford it, and it would make the game experience much more comfortable.
Worried about largest attendance? Add a couple rows to the top.
Getting in line 6 hours early doesn't necessarily mean you really care more. It means you have a lot of time to waste. There were people who literally did not know who Zack Novak was and yet skipped their classes to get in line for the Ohio basketball game (9pm start) at noon.
If YOU care more, get in line early. If you dont, show up late and sit in the nosebleeds. I feel like making a diagram...No, all the people who care will not be able to do their studying in line(although it sure would pass the time). However, MOST of the people willing to give their time to Hokeville will be those who care whether Michigan wins or loses.
how long you are willing to waste time waiting in lines, maybe you'd care to join me as I line up for UTL six hours before the game starts? Clearly, if you don't, you don't care about Michigan Football. We can talk about how dang awful it was when the students used to show up late.
April 23rd, 2013 at 10:12 PM ^
You get dave to sell me tickets to UTL for $40 and I will sit right next to uou for six hours. Gotta warn you, I'm a snorer.
April 23rd, 2013 at 10:20 PM ^
This is the way it has been since time immemorial. So the argument that "well the students are lucky to get those discounted tickets in the first place!" is just plain disingenuous. Maybe you think it'd be better off if they just got rid of the student section entirely?
April 23rd, 2013 at 10:17 PM ^
April 23rd, 2013 at 10:56 PM ^
I am a student at CMU but I attend a few Michigan games a year and I actually don't mind sitting up higher in the student section (usually only ticket i could get). It is still a really good view of the field.
April 23rd, 2013 at 11:51 PM ^
Why are people still debating this as if it's some complicated moral dilemma? It's very simple. GA seating is probably a good thing for the atmosphere of the stadium. It also screws over many good fans by forcing them to wait hours in line for something that they wouldn't have had to wait for before tha change, all because of the actions of a few thousand lazy fans.
Couldn't students hypothetically just skip over the so called "5,000 person line" by going to another gate to enter 5 minutes before the gates open? In the past I have entered as a student through the SW gate near Pioneer. It will be interesting to see if the athletic department took this into consideration and will only allow students to enter at the NE gate to keep it fair.
Assign seats as had been done in the past. Your ticket entitles you to sit in that seat ONLY if you enter the stadium a set time before kickoff (15, 20, 30 minutes?). After that time period expires, the rest of the seats at GA. Students who enter on time would get their tickets stamped at the gate. No stamp, GA.
April 24th, 2013 at 10:49 AM ^
Also, I understand many of you don't agree, but I think all the negging is a little much. Its a relevant topic and many people are against GA as well.
I downvoted not for the petition itself, but for the "don't post if you don't agree with me" thing you had going there.