Go Bus, 24-Hour Library Are Massive Waste

By Broadside Opinion Contributor Sarah Fort

With the spring semester underway, I was eager to see the most recent copy of Broadside on the racks. Initially, I saw nothing that surprised me as I glanced through the pages: freshmen caught drinking in Presidents Park, advertisements for people wanting to adopt babies, sports statistics, the usual. Yearning for a little more excitement, I searched through the articles I don’t normally find interesting. What I found there actually did surprise me.

What is a “Go-Bus”? I mean, I read the article, but the concept is still somehow baffling. I read further, in horror, at the newest waste of money George Mason University—or the Student Government, I don’t know which—has decided to foist on the student body.

This “Go-Bus” is a proposed shuttle that will carry freshmen (because it will be mostly freshmen who utilize this feature) to places that can already be reached by another bus service. Wonderful. I rode the CUE bus (for free) often my freshman year, so I feel for people who don’t have cars on campus. Regardless, I am less than enthusiastic about Mason wasting more of my money on something I’ll have little use for.

I continued reading and got to the Opinion section of the paper. In big, bold letters I read “Why Mason Needs a 24-Hour Library”. I literally cringed. When I saw the smiling face of Student Body President, Zach Golden, I cringed again. Isn’t this the same fellow who wanted to throw my money at a shuttle that neither I nor the majority of my 30,000 tuition-paying friends will ever use? Golden believes that Mason needs a 24-hour library to increase its prestige. He argues that commuter students would benefit greatly from this service, as they would have somewhere to study before early-morning classes. I feel this begs the question: are they commuters, or are they homeless?

With no offense intended toward the homeless community, this is asinine. If you are a commuter student with early-morning classes, chances are that you’re at home directly before those classes begin. Is Golden supposing that commuters get out of class at 10 p.m. (at the latest) and think to themselves, “Oh man, just nine and a half hours until my 7:30 a.m. exam... Where will I go to study at 4 a.m.?”

You know where they’ll be? They’ll be home. Golden also argues that residential freshmen will make use of a 24-hour library so they have somewhere to study when their roommates are trying to sleep. During my previous two years at Mason, I had between one and four roommates. If I needed somewhere to study after 2 a.m. and before 7 a.m. (when the JC, SUB I, and SUB II are open), I could have gone to a common room, study lounge or a friend’s room, but frankly, I never had to study that badly before 7 a.m. They’re freshmen, Mr. Golden, not masochists. While I can understand opening a library for 24 hours during finals week, the cost of lighting, heating, cleaning, and staffing a 24/7 library is too great to justify its semester-long use.

His motive, however, is something I agree with: Mason needs to address modern student needs. You know what need I want you to address, Mr. President? My need to not pay more tuition money, because paying more tuition money is exactly what I will be doing if this harebrained scheme and others like it are put into effect. Where else will the money paying for these services, that benefit slim minorities of the Mason community, be coming from? I know that throwing money around has become quite popular these days, but I’d like to think that Mason treats its community better than the crooks in Washington treat the country.