Slope Day - tix for alumni

Sorry for the non-hockey thread .........

A buddy and I are headed back to Ithaca for some relaxation (read: drinking) slope day weekend. Apparently they're a bit more uptight than they used to be in our day when you just showed up with your case of beer. In any event, students need to buy tix in advance for "friends". We graduated, oh just a few years ago........in 1992, so I don't still have friends on campus.

Anyone willing to sponsor us, for a nominal fee of course? To exclude two generous alumni would be a shame.

Eric

You need tickets to go to Springfe^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H Slope Day now?!

Beeeej

No, Students can get in with just their ID's, but guests need a student to buy them a guest ticket for $25, and each student is only allowed to buy 2.

Even the fact that they now check IDs astonishes me.

Beeeej

I only need 2 tix guys ......... I'm sensing that a deal can be struck.

Us: Lots of beer (for those 21 and older of course), no access to Slope Day
Students: Access to Slope Day, need beer

Yeah, Slope Day kinda sucks now in comparison to what it once was. I believe 2001 was the last really good Slope Day (combination of administrative circumstances and good weather).

OOC (as I'm in CA and wont be there...), do they run the IDs through anything, or would recent alumni be able to get in if they still have their IDs?

This faq says that you should email the organizers: [www.slopeday.cornell.edu]

Oh, and the history sections gives us:

1984 - 2000
In the face of these legal changes and the public sentiment that precipitated it, it was no longer feasible for the university to allow the event. Slope Day, as it came to be called, became an informal gathering of students on university property. During that time, the focus of Slope Day shifted from food, music and celebration to widespread and uncontrolled alcohol consumption.

I'm very glad that my time at school is known for its "widespread and uncontrolled alcohol comsumption."

I am an alumni as well and I think it is crazy that alumni can't attend without a sponser...sure let us pay...but c'mon we are all part of the extended Cornell community. I won't be making slope day this year...but I sure hope someone helps out RatushnyFan.

I assume (I haven't read the webpage) that alumni have to be sponsored because the university's insurance wouldn't cover them.

And you're "an alumnus." Alumni is plural. Sheesh!!

Beeeej

[q]I am an alumni as well and I think it is crazy that alumni can't attend without a sponser.[/q]They don't want the students to be there (liability) - why would they encourage alums to come?

[q]And you're "an alumnus." Alumni is plural. Sheesh!![/q]Or an alumna....

(Though since I don't know, alumnus is right.)

I still have my '93 "Don't be a Dope on the Slope T-Shirt...Slope Day '93. Keep it Safe. Keep it Fun. Stay in Control". One of the first attempts at sober monitoring. Unfortunately, I was quite drunk while performing that duty.

Fight the power. Have a great slope day!

[Q]Scersk '97 Wrote:
During that time, the focus of Slope Day shifted from food, music and celebration to widespread and uncontrolled alcohol consumption.[/q]Well, yeah, but... it was FUN that way.

[Q]MattShaf Wrote:

I still have my '93 "Don't be a Dope on the Slope T-Shirt...Slope Day '93. Keep it Safe. Keep it Fun. Stay in Control". One of the first attempts at sober monitoring. Unfortunately, I was quite drunk while performing that duty.

[/q]

Please please please tell me you have a picture of yourself in that shirt lying passed out on top of a pile of beer cans on the slope...

So as an Alumnus planning on returning, this concerned me. While they will be checking ID's, its is ~98% likely they will not swipe them, meaning as long as you don't look to old they should work.

RatushnyFan, email me and I will put you in touch with someone who can help you out.

mbcohen@mail.med.upenn.edu

just curious...what are they charging you for? is it for the blow up slides and what not? interesting...

My guess is that is to cover the cost of the concerts, since beer is something you must also pay an arm and a leg for

Alas, I have only seen pictures and heard stories of these alleged "fun" slope days. But they have accomplished their goal and gotten rid of binge drinking on the slope, it's just moved to collegetown and the dorms

beer/wine are actually really cheap at slope day. its $1/cup for either if its like last year

Drinks are indeed $1 - I could have sworn it was priced more like a ballpark, but no argument here

[Q]Will Wrote:

Yeah, Slope Day kinda sucks now in comparison to what it once was. I believe 2001 was the last really good Slope Day (combination of administrative circumstances and good weather).[/q]
Yeah, 2001 was the last real good slope day. 2002 had ugly weather, and 2003 is when they ruined it (and had ugly weather as well), if I remember correctly.

The money may go toward paying for concerts. But I suspect it's also meant to keep some people away. Charge admission and some people won't want to come.

Glad I was there under the wire....having graduated in 2001, I never got to see this horrible incarnation. Of course, my first slope day was the first that they wired off the top of the hill and I think they started banning glass either that year or the next.

I never made it to my freshman Slope Day. I was way too drunk and barely conscious, having consumed the better part of a bottle of Grey Goose and gone to not one, but two minority parties the night before.

I recall my "Slope Day" as "Springfest," which tells you what decade I came from

My freshman year (1984): The Ramones in Barton Hall (bad weather)
My sophomore year (1985): Lousy weather, and I don't recall if there was a band
My junior year (1986): I think this was the year when Day Hall unilaterally relocated "Springfest" to North Campus (Helen Newman field). Weather was not great, and I think we all went to get the free food and brought it back to the Libe Slope. Kind of an unofficial beginning of the "uncontrolled era."
My senior year (1987): Glorious weather. Robert Cray (who?) played the blues in front of the War Memorial. The following week he was on the cover of the Rolling Stone magazine.

Ah, those were the days...

Thanks to Scersk and gobigred24 for responding to the question at hand with helpful information.

And thanks to Beeeej for hanging around on the fringes, pulling out the Strunk & White/Elements of Style crap. I'm sure that wasxmonkey could use a guy with your skills in his high profile buy-side asset management job. While he's making millions, he could probably throw a few scraps your way to make sure that his grammar and spelling are TOP NOTCH!! Keep up the good work.

[Q]CU at Stanford Wrote:

I recall my "Slope Day" as "Springfest," which tells you what decade I came from

My freshman year (1984): The Ramons in Barton Hall (bad weather)
My sophomore year (1985): Lousy weather, and I don't recall if there was a band
My junior year (1986): I think this was the year when Day Hall unilaterally relocated "Springfest" to North Campus (Helen Newman field). Weather was not great, and I think we all went to get the free food and brought it back to the Libe Slope. Kind of an unofficial beginning of the "uncontrolled era."
My senior year (1987): Glorious weather. Robert Cray (who?) played the blues in front of the War Memorial. The following week he was on the cover of the Rolling Stone magazine.

Ah, those were the days... [/q]

And in '86, they had the Del Fuegos playing on North (led by Dan Zanes, who, in one of those circle-of-life things for me, is now an incredibly popular children's "rock-n-roll" singer in my area).

For those who don't know, the name "Slope Day" is derived from the grass-roots movement, "Take Back the Slope Day".

Snoop Dogg is the featured act on Slope Day. Not sure if you old timer Alumni would enjoy that type of music..
snooooooooooooooop

Hey, I watch Snoop Dogg's show on MTV. I'm down with the shizzle. That time he rolled up the catnip and smoked it and blew it in the cats faces at the pet store was classic.

[Q]RatushnyFan Wrote:
Thanks to Scersk and gobigred24 for responding to the question at hand with helpful information.
[/q]
So, since I'm kind of interested for future reference, what's the word on alums?

No response yet from the email address in the FAQ. I'm trying to get set up with a current student as an alternative. I'll keep you posted.

"Music"? I thought you said it was Snoop Dogg.

Beeeej

Theres been a lot of trouble with local HS kids trying to go to slope day (i know because i used to be one of them) especially Ithaca HS because its only about .5 miles away.

300 tix "reserved" for alumni .......... you have to go to the Alumni House at 8 am on Slope Day to purchase them. They cross check your I.D. with the alumni database.

I wrote an angry yet constructive letter to the Slope Day Planning board this year. Basically I told them that charging alum to come back to the campus was flat out insulting and offered some constructive alternatives for next year... we'll see what happens.

Excellent idea. Making it difficult for recent alums to come back and remember how much we loved East Hill is a great way to get us to start donating $$$

[Q]gobigred24 Wrote:

Excellent idea. Making it difficult for recent alums to come back and remember how much we loved East Hill is a great way to get us to start donating $$$[/q]

What? The university should make it easy for alums to come back for the sole purpose of drinking way too much alcohol and supplying it to underage students?

If you want to come back to remember the good times on East Hill, the university has plenty of other events that you could attend, for free.

I didn't say the administration should make it easy. It just shouldn't make it more difficult. And I do attend those other events as well. But for recent grads (I finished up last May) with many friends still in Ithaca, Slope Day is a nice occassion to come back to. Plus, I mean, its Snoop!

[Q]gobigred24 Wrote:

I didn't say the administration should make it easy. It just shouldn't make it more difficult. And I do attend those other events as well. But for recent grads (I finished up last May) with many friends still in Ithaca, Slope Day is a nice occassion to come back to. Plus, I mean, its Snoop![/q]Don't you get it? The administration does not want you at Slope Day! That's why they want to make it difficult - to discourage you from coming. Given how liability works in this country it is absolutely the right decision to make. And don't kid yourself - there is no way no the administration is going to change this policy based on the threat that some recent alums might not give money (I'd venture that RatushnyFan is the exception - most alums heading up for Slope Day are probably only a few years from graduation).

EDIT: Apologies if the first line sounds overly harsh.

Well, not sure they would allow anyone (even of age) to bring in alcohol as they now _sell_ it apparently on the slope. So the oldies wouldn't be supplying much alcohol.....unless they kept buying it for those underage I guess...

No worries on offending me, I have thick skin But I agree with you- most alumni going back (myself included) are recently removed from graduation. And all this does is leave people with a bad taste in their mouths. I understand the concern over liability, what i dislike is that the administration tries to hide behind other reasons, when CYA was the rationale behind most of the Slope Day changes in the first place. And all most of the other changes did was force drinking behind closed doors- now the freshmen do a bunch of shots in their dorm rooms before going out to the slope, and end up just as sick, because they drink a lot, quickly.

What I find amazing about this is that so many colleges have some sort of spring festival (I am now at Penn, in the midst of Spring Fling) and don't seem to have these sorts of problems, while Cornell does. It like the Lynah ticket situation- why not look at what schools in similar situations- popular sport, small arena, academic emphasis, like Duke for squeakball- do about tickets and try to use that? Cornell's problems are not unique, yet we seem to have a much harder time solving them

Hey - I'm young in spirit, if 35 in reality. You're never too old to visit beautiful Ithaca and if you have the chance to get liquored up on the slope, why not? Besides, Pep misses us ......... mysteriously a big chunk of his cash flow disappeared circa June 1992. I too care about liability so of course I won't be facilitating underage drinking.

For those who missed it Snoop Dogg was great ........ my ears were ringing for a day or two afterwards. And Ithaca is still fantastic. Talked to Pep at length and he ran through what happened with Lee and that the two buyers of his stake had left town and were shirking on their barkeeping responsibilities. Much has changed, but much will also never change.

[Q]RatushnyFan Wrote:

For those who missed it Snoop Dogg was great ........ my ears were ringing for a day or two afterwards. And Ithaca is still fantastic. Talked to Pep at length and he ran through what happened with Lee and that the two buyers of his stake had left town and were shirking on their barkeeping responsibilities. Much has changed, but much will also never change.[/q]

Had the same conversation with Pep when I was there last month. I said that it seems they turned out to be absentee landlords, and he said, "More like absentee assholes."

Then I carried him in darts for 7 games.

Yes, much will never change.