The question all semester has been what will we be studying next semester. WIth all of our talk about Marcellus Shale and energy responsibility and with our visit to Pittsburgh where we heard from Terry Pegula about his energy work, I thought our topic would be the future of energy at Penn State. The project would entail research into the various possibilities, interviews with students and staff about the feasibility and the environmental-ness of a project like this. We would present our proposals at the end of the semester, complete with pros, cons, ways to implement and a work up of everything involved to make our proposal work. It would be a lot of work on our parts, but we would be able to see the results of our efforts rather quickly.
So, when Dean Brady proposed the idea of changing fan behavior at sports games, I was shocked. It was the last topic I would have picked. Not only would we have to come up with a solution for this problem, we have to first identify what the cause of this problem is. The questions I kept asking myself during class were, what can we possibly do to fix this problem? Why are fans going to listen to us? How are we going to make them change their behavior? With these questions being unanswered, it made the topic seem that much more daunting.
I am one of those people who does not like to do a project for the sake of doing a project. I like to have a purpose, to have end result or a long term goal to look towards. With a project like this, it seems unlikely that anything would come of our proposals--so why bother? The same questions were asked during last years class when they tackled high-risk college drinking. Why do we need to bother? Because it is a problem on our campus and we need to do whatever we can to fix it. We may take small steps at first, but those first steps are the ones that get us and the rest of the student body to take larger, more effective steps.
The same is true of THON. We do all of this work all year long to raise money for pediatric cancer research and the Four Diamonds Fund. Many people are involved because they know someone with cancer, many are involved because it's the thing to do in the spring. But we all work for the kids. It is their future, their health and safety that we are working towards curing. We can see those numbers go up at the end of the 46 hours, but the connection between what those numbers do for those kids is kind of lost, at least for me. I have to constantly remind myself that standing out at a street corner in the freezing cold raising dollar after dollar is all going towards the treatment and care of those children. We may not be able to see the physical results of our work (except in the numbers), but we know that we are making a difference in the lives of those children. Just like we would be making a difference in the culture of Penn State if we changed how fans behaved towards visiting fans. As long as we are reminded of the long term goal while we are working, this project, to tackle fan behavior is definitely worth it.
So, when Dean Brady proposed the idea of changing fan behavior at sports games, I was shocked. It was the last topic I would have picked. Not only would we have to come up with a solution for this problem, we have to first identify what the cause of this problem is. The questions I kept asking myself during class were, what can we possibly do to fix this problem? Why are fans going to listen to us? How are we going to make them change their behavior? With these questions being unanswered, it made the topic seem that much more daunting.
I am one of those people who does not like to do a project for the sake of doing a project. I like to have a purpose, to have end result or a long term goal to look towards. With a project like this, it seems unlikely that anything would come of our proposals--so why bother? The same questions were asked during last years class when they tackled high-risk college drinking. Why do we need to bother? Because it is a problem on our campus and we need to do whatever we can to fix it. We may take small steps at first, but those first steps are the ones that get us and the rest of the student body to take larger, more effective steps.
The same is true of THON. We do all of this work all year long to raise money for pediatric cancer research and the Four Diamonds Fund. Many people are involved because they know someone with cancer, many are involved because it's the thing to do in the spring. But we all work for the kids. It is their future, their health and safety that we are working towards curing. We can see those numbers go up at the end of the 46 hours, but the connection between what those numbers do for those kids is kind of lost, at least for me. I have to constantly remind myself that standing out at a street corner in the freezing cold raising dollar after dollar is all going towards the treatment and care of those children. We may not be able to see the physical results of our work (except in the numbers), but we know that we are making a difference in the lives of those children. Just like we would be making a difference in the culture of Penn State if we changed how fans behaved towards visiting fans. As long as we are reminded of the long term goal while we are working, this project, to tackle fan behavior is definitely worth it.
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