When I got the DrexelALERT that all students will be required to stay an extra five days on co-op or in school (and that Drexel Police had cleared the area), I was understandably upset. I thought maybe Drexel had learned from #MyLegacy and realized Drexel Dragons have had enough with purchasable school spirit. But no, this attempt to “make up snow days” is only a gambit to ensure our Dragon Dollars are spent on Drexel businesses and library printing. Drexel’s Facebook page even tried to put this extension in a positive light by congratulating students on their continuous school efforts: “All this year, Drexel students worked like slaves. But they were happy in their work; they grudged no effort of sacrifice, well aware that everything they did was for the benefit of themselves and those of their kind who would come after them.” Even President Curly Fries commented, “They were always cold, and usually hungry as well, but they continued on in their studies and made Drexel look really, really good.”
One cannot help but ask, “Why do we need to make up five days for only having off three and a half?” No one seems able to answer this with certainty, and things seem to be getting stranger around Drexel. I see students wearing their Drexel IDs on their sweatshirts, pinning it to their left breast. Professors seem to be disappearing once they speak against the extension in class and the Drexel security and police forces are enclosing Drexel ever so slightly. President Fries, in an attempt to pacify worried students about the impending extension, wrote in a mass email to the Drexel community, “Do not imagine, colleagues, that leadership is a pleasure. On the contrary, it is a deep and heavy responsibility. No one believes more firmly than me that all Dragons are equal. I would be only too happy to let you make decisions for yourselves. But sometimes you might make the wrong decisions …” Understandably, every freshman has their day after a night of inexperienced and unwise binge drinking, but to say that we make wrong decisions “sometimes” is a step too far. Why can’t we decide how to make up the three and a half snow days? Why can’t we vote on it?
It’s not fair that we have to be “hauled in” even if we peacefully demonstrate our opposition to this unjust extension. Drexel security has hurt more people on their police bikes than they’ve helped. My colleague, Matt, recently had his foot run over by a security officer chasing a sophomore computer science major down Lancaster Walk who failed to show his Dragon Card. Another time, Drexel Police officers beat a junior English major reading “Atlas Shrugged” in public, and he cried out, “Can we all get along?”
This snow day “make up” or better known as “Extension of the Drexel Shaft” is only a stratagem to strengthen the security force of Drexel and bolster President Curly Fries’ ego. There is no need for extra days of school or unpaid co-op, and us students need to make a stand. I encourage everyone to occupy Drexel Park and show our displeasure with the corrupt powers of Drexel’s administration.
Henge-A-Min Hill-Chester is a sophomore in Drexel’s Druidic Studies major, concentrating in human sacrifice and bizarre sexual rituals. He can be contacted at thanks.obama@therectangle.org.