All The News That is Fit To Print at the University at Amherst
Richard P. Leader reporting

Unavailable: Senior Challenge 2001

Most of you have probably received the call before, the one where your mother or your roommate hands you the phone and says that it is UB, and you are sweating bullets figuring they finally put a check stop on your grades for not paying for those overdue fines down at the library. Thankfully, it is usually only someone hitting you up for money to pay for some other poor and underprivileged student to have the joy of a UB education--if you are taking out loans for yourself, they figure, why not for someone else too?

If you happen to not feel personally insulted by that one, fear not, for there is another scam currently going on that is so shady that it would make even Jim Bakker cringe. A few months ago, thousands of cards went out to UB seniors promoting the "Senior Challenge 2001" bearing the slogan "You're not a freshman anymore..."--which is possibly a more inclusive phrase at UB than "You're only a senior once!" The fine print alerted students that they would soon receive a phone call soliciting for donations for a senior class gift to the university.

When they first called me, like most of you, I lied and said I had to go to work and I could not speak to them. Little did I know that my "work" time would be punched into the RuffaloCODY.com software, and then knowing my schedule, it would be able to devise a "better" time to reach me in the future. And they did--and boy were they ever sorry. I learned that the UB Calling Center is a telemarketing warehouse on south campus where they usually troll for alumni donations but also hit us undergrads up as well. It is primarily staffed by students and governed by the Office of Student Development. Now, what does that mean? Imagine you have a birthday coming up. You want presents, lots and lots of presents. What better way to get them, than to grub around for friend's credit card number and offer to do all the legwork yourself? Of course, that would look sort of greedy, and perhaps that is why when I requested the phone number of the UB Calling Service from the telemarketer, she said that she could not because "it was against their policy." It might also explain why my Caller ID box listed their number as "unavailable" and why the Office of Student Development's web page seems to have been taken offline.

You know how it is in the public's best interest for state government run institutions to hide valuable information like that. You can reach the UB Calling Center at 716-829-3002, so if you ever want to give telemarketers a taste of their own medicine, or write it and "for a good time" in a public restroom, go ahead. I would not advise it, but I would find it damn funny if you did.

Now, you say, "what is that about THEM choosing the gift--they did say senior class, right?" You know as well as I do that "class" is just about as meaningless here at UB. In fact, a fellow Generation editor is half way through graduate school and has yet to get his undergrad diploma due to a technicality. But by incorporating that language, as well as some actual Student Association materials in the picture on the flyers, you would get the impression that the Senior Challenge 2001 is sanctioned by your elected student officials. It is not, and they themselves are inquiring into this matter at this very moment.
What I can tell you, is that in one of the personal photographs included in the flyers scene, there appears former SA president Naniette Coleman, as well as a rare back-stage pass to the 1998 Busta Rhyme's show--a Fallfest that coincidentally occurred during her administration. Schmoozing with celebrities is by far the best part of being SA prez.

Former SA Pres. Naniette Coleman,
left of upper right pair, center of bottom trio

Coleman is currently employed by the office of Student Developments, and actually headed up 1998's Senior Challenge, which intended to establish a scholarship fund, though was unable to fulfill that goal due to insufficient donations. If the UB Calling Center is unable to drum up support, I would not put it past the university to add the basic $100 cost of the donation to our tuition bills as a special "senior" fee to continue the great tradition.

Back stage pass to a Busta Rhyme's
show, box titled "Student Life" filled
with complementary ticket stubs.
What, every student doesn't get this?

That is not to say that a senior gift is a bad idea. The class of 1992 donated the university seal on the floor of the Student Union. A seal that was considered bad luck to tread upon for many years. However, few students today realize its significance as they stomp the ice off of their boots on it. Indeed, one would think that these gifts would be remembered, though university officials were hard pressed to come up with a simple listing of the gifts, as one had not already been prepared.

Now, you might ask, "What kind of student would give a donation like that?" A fair question, it would certainly take a special sort of person. A friend of mine once donated $200 to the men's basketball team as his legacy to UB. He is now going to medical school--in the Caribbean--where, I am told, the standards are a bit different. There was this joke that he always used to tell, "What do you call the person who graduates last in their class in medical school? A doctor." We should all be very afraid.