Perhaps the best bathroom reading here in Hanover is our own Organizations, Regulations and Courses book. In those 10 minutes (give or take) of lavatory study time, you can learn much about the little rules by which we must abide here at Dartmouth.
Recently, I found myself buried in pages 112 through 116, the part which deals with College charges. Because many complain that our college drains us of every cent we have, I have chosen this week to share my restroom insights with you.
Tuition, room, board and "other services," as the ORC so eloquently puts it, cost roughly $23,000 per year. That simply gets us in the proverbial door, to say nothing of other expenses that we college students must cover each term. But that huge sum of money is not where the College makes its killing. No sir. In my extensive study of the ORC, I have noticed a rather ugly money-grubbing trend to which our beloved college seems to have attached itself.
That trend, my friends, is the itemized fee. Included in the list of fees which the College can collect are as follows:
-$50 for late registration
-$10 for late filing of a major
-$5 for adding, dropping, or exchanging a course after the first five days of a term
-$35 Student Activities fee each term
-$25 for each term of transfer work
-$50 for each term of P.E. "necessitated by failure through the student's own negligence"
And these fees are just the tip of the iceberg. Basically, you name it and Dartmouth has a fee for it. In fact, there is even a late fee for failing to pay any of the aforementioned fees on time. Yep, 1.5 percent of the amount payable or $15, whichever is greater, of course. In effect, we have a late fee for a late late fee.
But the situation only gets worse from here. We are inundated with "services" that further nickel and dime us. Look at Dartalk, for example. Do we get phone bills like any other normal American? No way. We have to have an account under the communist fascist policies of the Office of Telephone Services, drained when we make long-distance phone calls. And what happens if we accidentally spend an extra five minutes on the phone and have a negative balance? You guessed it, another fee for "reactivation."
While on the subject of communism, let's look at the housing situation. For around $1000 per term, we get a dorm room. That $1000 can pay for a huge single in the new dorms with a bathroom, or a one-room closet double in the Choates that yields about 100 square feet per person. The price does indeed vary, but not by very much.
Then there's Dartmouth Dining Services. Not only is the food very overpriced, but freshmen are required to spend $920 per term for their meal plans in which they get either 10 or 14 "punches" per week. Those Hop fries may be good, but not that good. Upperclassmen get a better deal, but still have to invest a minimum of $336. And let's face it, DDS isn't exactly in danger of going bankrupt - just look at what Topside charges.
More? How about parking. We can get charged $50 for parking in "core areas" at the wrong time. And if we conveniently forget to pay that fine, you guessed it, it shows up on our college bill. How do they keep track of car identity? We register our cars with the College. And if we forget to do so, they stick us with a $25 ticket to force us into the Parking Operations office to acquire a registration sticker. So, they fine us so that we get parking stickers so they can fine us more easily in future fining situations.
We get "punched" by DDS, "reactivated" by Dartalk, reemed by ORL and fined for failing to pay fees. Based on all of this, I have two suggestions: 1) Create a D.F.A. (Declining Fee Account) whereby frequent offenders can simply have the fee deducted from the DFA. Of course, to be consistent with College policy, there would be a minimum nonrefundable balance of $250.
2) End the controversy surrounding our mascot once and for all. Not the Indian, not the Big Green - the Dartmouth College Bills. We could get football helmets like Buffalo's, but with dollar signs in the middle.
It's perfect.
