We've kind of left this alone, but it's become a bit of a national story
now: Duke, as you likely know, has a joint program with UNC and the
students, the Robertson Scholars, or at least the UNC-based Robertson Scholars, are
not going to be allowed to camp out this season.
Not everyone is thrilled with the decision, which was made by Duke student
government after UNC students camped out for tickets to the UNC game last season
and showed up in the middle of the Crazies with UNC shirts on, which is, let's
face it, offensive to Duke fans and would be offensive to UNC fans if the
situation were reversed.
Larry Moneta, Duke VP for student affairs, said the reaction was over the
top.
The principle of the Robertson program is wonderful, but Cameron may not be
the ideal place to realize it. And given that student attendance over the
early part of this season and parts of last season has been somewhat off,
perhaps an easier solution is an alternative to tenting.
Rather than giving priority to people for camping out for big games, perhaps
a weighted ranking system would be better: students get a certain number
of points for each game attended, and more points for each tuneup game (for lack
of a better word) they attend. So in this scheme, UNC might be worth, say
two points (seems about right to us!), but UNCG would be worth, say, 25.
So when the students line up for UNC or whatever big game is on the
schedule, they enter based on their attendance record, not on their willingness
to sleep in a tent.
Or they could rank the tent order based on the number of games
attended.
We can understand the desire to keep the UNC students out of a place
they mock and disdain, and, we might add, envy, because the spirit of the
Robertson program clashes with the spirit of the rivalry. But maybe
there's a better way to manage it.
Incidentally, thanks to the various students who reminded us that Duke had the nerve to schedule basketball games when people were trying to study for exams. Study hard! And thanks for reminding us.