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Davis

Davis, California

Friday, March 29, 2024

Editorial: Please innovate

For those who spent hours waiting in line outside the ARC Pavilion to obtain five pieces of paper for their family and friends to attend a commencement ceremony of equal length, one thing was evident: administrative efficiency is not present at UC Davis.

Tickets for the College of Letters & Science commencement ceremonies brought hundreds of people to the Pavilion on Monday.
It is safe to say it probably wasn’t the best day for those working the scant three-booth windows either, dealing with dehydrated and hungry students standing in the never-ending, sun-drenched line from hell, who most likely don’t want to sit through their own extremely long graduation anyway.

Students, with nothing but a bagel in their systems, became desperate for sustenance. These humans began to borderline worship those who offered them the prospect of a popsicle.

As time-strapped scholars who have responsibilities, we do not have three hours a day to spend waiting for something which we’ve already ordered.
Additionally, the University’s lack of communication skills contributed to this annoying situation. The school sent out an e-mail informing students to pick up their tickets a day before the first of the three pick-up days and proceeded to resend the same e-mail two more times within the hour. It’s pretty clear that with the two extra e-mails, notice was supposed to reach students much earlier.

Although it would have been wiser for these students to go pick up their graduation tickets the first day of distribution, students aren’t to blame. This problem shouldn’t even have arisen since the school should be smart enough to set up more convenient alternatives for students. Apparently, this happens year after year.

Adding to the frustration was the fact that an administrator came out to the line to inform students, some of which had been waiting at the Pavilion for over two hours, that they could pick up their tickets starting the next day at the Dean’s Office. Had students been informed that this was an option via e-mail, or really any other means of notification, prior to investing their little hearts and souls into this infamous line, they most likely would have waited a few days to try to get their tickets.
Here are some logical and simple solutions to prevent a similar debacle:

1. Scan our families into commencement: Movie tickets can be bought online through Fandango with few issues of fraud, why not graduation tickets?

2. Send them home: We would gladly pay the postage, so we don’t have to devote hours of our life to getting these tickets (the Engineering college automatically sends tickets to a preferred address).

3. List: Students provide the school with a list of names of people who will be attending under their name and guests can provide ID’s to confirm they are said guests.

We urge you, UC Davis administration, to think outside the box, in this case the ARC Pavilion Box Office, and save our toesies the pain of waiting in lines of pure bureaucracy.

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