Intrepid Event Cancelled Due To Saftey Concerns

The annual party aboard the U.S.S. Intrepid, a Columbia tradition and a highlight of Senior Week, has been cancelled, administrators announced yesterday. There are no plans to hold another off-campus party in its place.

Although the decision to cancel the party was made last semester, and student government representatives first learned of the decision in October, the student body was not officially informed until yesterday, raising questions of why students were not notified sooner.

The Office of Student Development and Activities and the College Activities Office made the decision to cancel Intrepid. Kevin Shollenberger, the executive director of the SDA, announced the cancellation yesterday afternoon in an e-mail to the Class of 2003, citing safety concerns as the primary reason for the cancellation.
That e-mail was quickly followed by an e-mail from Columbia College Student Body President Michael Novielli, CC '03, notifying the entire College of the decision.

Shollenberger's and Novielli's e-mails came only after it became apparent that Spectator was prepared to break the Intrepid story.

Since October, when the SDA and CAO first informed the senior class officers and the Senior Week chairs of the decision to cancel the Intrepid, the student groups have been negotiating for an alternative event of comparable purpose and grandeur.

A meeting with SDA and CAO, at which student leaders will present an alternative off-campus venue, is slated for Thursday.

"Over the past several years there have been diligent attempts to address the mounting safety, security, and health concerns that accompany this event but with unsatisfactory result[s]," Shollenberger wrote in his broadcast e-mail yesterday.

"The University has a responsibility to provide safe programming venues," wrote Cherie Sheridan, director of College Activities at CAO, and Shollenberger in an email.
According to Sheridan and Shollenberger, most of their concerns center around alcohol. In the past, they have sent "as many as 12 students in a given year to the hospital for alcohol poisoning the night of the event," they wrote.

Other altercations that contributed to their decision to cancel the Intrepid include "students smuggling in alcohol and other illegal drugs, students stumbling into traffic on the West Side Highway, students stealing full bottles of liquor from the bar, and students being belligerent to bar staff," according to the e-mail.

Some student leaders agree that the Intrepid has posed dangers.
"In the past, the Intrepid has become a very haphazard situation. Many students arrive on the scene drunk, and [the party's] proximity to streets and cars make it a potentially dangerous situation," said Laila Shetty, BC '03 and president of the Student Government Association.

Engineering Student Council President JaMel Nelson, SEAS '03, agreed.

"I don't have a problem with the Intrepid being cancelled. Anyone with a sound mind would know that there are problems," Nelson said.

But contentions have arisen over the SDA and CAO's handling of the issue.

"The administration doesn't realize the effect not having an end-of-the-year party will have on the students," Shetty said.

Upon hearing of the cancellation, Senior Week chairs Eleanor Coufos, CC '03, Caroline Seo, SEAS '03, and Yoogin Yang, BC '03, and the senior class presidents for the College, SEAS, and Barnard met last November with SDA and CAO administrators, who voiced eight concerns that caused them to cancel the event.
The SDA and CAO also requested that news of the cancellation not be released to the student body.

After that initial meeting, the Senior Week chairs and the senior class presidents drafted a four-page proposal that addressed each point and "stressed the importance of the Intrepid as one of the few traditions at our university," Novielli wrote in his mass e-mail yesterday.

In hopes of addressing administrators' concerns, the student leaders presented a proposal to Shollenberger and Sheridan in a meeting on Dec. 11, 2002. Although they felt that their proposal sufficiently addressed the eight concerns that were cited a month earlier, the proposal was rejected, according to Kim Grant, CC '03 and the president of the College's senior class.

Novielli's e-mail also stated that "the chairs and presidents were told that they were not allowed to hold a school-wide celebration off campus. After further negotiations, SDA and CAO stated that there was a 1% chance that a school-wide off campus celebration could still happen."

Student leaders were disappointed with the results of their efforts at negotiation.

"After spending two solid weeks on campus studying for finals, students do not want to have to go to a party that's at the same place they've been for the past two weeks," Shetty said.
Clinging to that 1 percent chance, the Senior Week chairs and senior class presidents spent winter break seeking alternate venues and created another proposal.

In their e-mail, Shollenberger and Sheridan wrote that they "recognize the importance of tradition at Columbia University, and as such we have made diligent attempts to address all of these issues in an effort to continue the event."

But that reassurance rang hollow for some students.
Even Nelson, who said he understands the decision, had concerns about the SDA's reasoning. "I understand that the Intrepid is not the easiest event to handle, but I feel like SDA is using safety concerns as a scapegoat to avoid the difficult efforts of putting it together," Nelson said.

According to Shollenberger and Sheridan, however, compromises to address these safety concerns in past years have proven untenable.

For example, in the University has previously provided transportation to and from the event to promote safety. However, "student conduct on and surrounding the buses created more safety and security problems," according to Shollenberger and Sheridan, who cited rowdy or intoxicated students as safety concerns.

Still, some student leaders feel that more could be done.
"It's very frustrating working with the two offices," Nelson said. "It's been an uphill battle since November, and not many concessions have been made. You would expect the SDA office to build up a student community, but that hasn't been so."

Grant refused to comment on what steps the student leaders would be taking after this week's meeting, saying only that she hopes they can reach an agreement with the SDA and CAO for an alternate off-campus celebration.

The CCSC, meanwhile, has promised to keep the student body informed on its progress and the results of the upcoming meeting.
Despite the controversy over the Intrepid decision, some students are not upset by the news.

"Maybe it would be a loss of tradition, but I don't really care," Jeffrey Hsieh, CC '03, said.

According to Hubert Lin, SEAS '05, the precautionary measures used in past years may have prevented some students from enjoying the event.

"The Intrepid experience was anything but intrepid. We waited in long lines to get past security and then when we finally got on the boat, there was not enough time left to really have fun," Lin said.
However, for the 2,000 students each year that help the Intrepid keep its reputation as a sold-out event, its absence this year, and in years to come, will be a disappointment.

"The Intrepid is a wonderful community-building event. All students, from first-years to seniors, enjoy it and look forward to it every year. It would be a real shame if the event did not take place," Novielli said.