The beginning of the new school year means that those of you in the Class of 2015 must begin to think about not only what you want to be, but also who you want to be. For our returning students, it provides an opportunity to reflect on your previous years and to make adjustments both in your coursework and also in your decisions about your life in the community. For most of you, this is a fine−tuning process; pushing yourself to pursue something you have wanted to try and maybe finding the willpower to avoid something that has caused you concern. For new students, this is inevitably a time for experimentation. This was the first big social weekend of the year. It seems to me that the experimentation didn't go so well for too many new students, and that there are some things for all of us to reflect upon.
On Friday evening, 11 students required transportation to emergency rooms due to intoxication, mostly from Fall Ball at the Gantcher Center. Most of these were first−year students. I am glad to say that none suffered permanent physical harm, although it was a close call for some. However, I am not so sure that none suffered permanent reputational harm. The image and memory of someone puking his or her guts out before making it to the bathroom, and then being carried off by the paramedics, is slow to fade. If you are one of these students — or one of the many others whose condition Tufts Emergency Medical Services and the ambulance crews had to assess — I am thankful that you are physically okay. But how much of that was just luck? Intoxication results in death for hundreds of students across the country every year. If you are one of those who provided or kept pouring the alcohol for these students, you are lucky, too. How would you feel today, and forever, if you had contributed to another student's death?
So as long as I'm lecturing, let me raise something else about which the community should reflect. Tickets for Fall Ball were free. But all sorts of reports are circulating of students selling their tickets to others for as much as 100 dollars. What's that all about? Do the values in our community include taking advantage of others in this way? Everyone pays the Student Activity Fee that provides the funding for co−curricular events, but venues obviously have varying capacities — so not everyone is going to be able to get into each and every concert, lecture or dance. I hope our community values don't now include trying to obtain a ticket just to make a profit by selling or re−selling it to someone else. That seems pretty crass. We have never needed a school policy about this, but it appears we do now, so I will be asking the Committee on Student Life to ban scalping as part of the Code of Conduct. You should know, by the way, that under Massachusetts law it is illegal to resell a ticket for more than two dollars above its face value unless you are a licensed ticket agency. And may I say again, the tickets for Fall Ball were free.
Please do spend some time thinking about what kind of person you want to be and how you want to be seen by others. You should take care of yourself. And you should also take care of others. That's always been a strong value in the Tufts community.
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