Frosh activities extend beyond diversity

By DANIEL GINGISS Changes in this year's New Student Orientation allowed freshmen to experience diversity rather than just learn about it. Last year, several University students performed "A Different World," a sociodrama for freshmen about life at the University. The following day, the freshmen listened to speeches as part of a Labor Day diversity program. Then, they broke up into small groups and discussed multi-culturalism. The only problem with the program, organizers said, is that students didn't seem to like it except for the sociodrama. "We had been working with the same format with the Labor Day program for four years," said Terri White, director of Academic Support Services, which oversees NSO. "We were receiving pretty much the same feedback [from students] the discussions were worthwhile, but it just wasn't working for students. It didn't hold the meaning that we hoped it would." The sociodrama was repeated Sunday by eight University students, and again received a favorable student response. But the Labor Day programming was vastly different. Students participated in residence-sponsored activities designed to teach them how to live in a new and diverse community and to meet their new neighbors. Each residence had a different program with the same theme. "Residential Living requested a date to spend with students in residence," said Laurie Reed, assistant director for Academic Support Services. "We decided to incorporate multicultural issues into the sociodrama, therefore freeing up that day for the residences." With the inclusion of "multicultural issues," the sociodrama packed at least eight topics into 45-minute sociodrama, ranging from alcohol and sex to segregated seating in the Class of 1920 Commons dining hall. Each topic was presented as a skit, and each skit ended with five choices for the students. One skit portrayed a woman who wanted to leave a party, but her roommate would not leave with her. The five choices for the woman were: to run home, dial 898-RIDE, ask a "cute guy" to walk her home, "suck it up" and stay at the party or call her mother. College junior Liz Chen and College senior Airea Walker, both performers in the drama, said they while they liked the script for this year's show, they would like to see the topics expanded on in the future. "We only had 45 minutes," Chen said. "We had to get eight or nine topics in so we couldn't really go full-depth." Walker said she feels discussing campus-specific issues such as the "water buffalo" case and the removal of 14,000 copies of The Daily Pennsylvanian last semester would be valuable to freshmen. "They may have read [about these issues] in the DP, but they need to know what's going on from all sides," she said. Other activities during NSO included Summerfest '93 in Super Block, a "wild video dance party" in the Quadrangle, a casino night in Houston Hall, and a trip to the Philadelphia Phillies-Chicago Cubs game at Veteran's Stadium.