Students deserve free meal

by Staff Editorial

Last weekend, only 44 people came. But that could be explained away by the Iowa-Iowa State football game according to Rich Ramos, adviser of Campus Activities Board.

Then this weekend, approximately 24 people came. Last year, approximately 100-120 people would come to midnight breakfast every weekend. There’s no good explanation for why students stayed away this weekend. It must be the $2 charge. Obviously, students aren’t too happy about it.

The $2 charge was introduced this year because CAB can’t afford to buy breakfast anymore. But why not?

The charge has been introduced even though CAB gets the biggest chunk of the budget assigned by the Student Government Association. The amount of money isn’t in question though.

When SGA gives out money to a group, it bases part of the decision on how much of the student body the group benefits. Technically, groups that benefit more of the student body should get more money. Since CAB does benefit most, if not all, of campus, it should get the most money.

What’s questionable is the management of CAB’s funds. It’s hard to believe that a group receiving $120,000 for the year is really running on a tight budget. Perhaps, CAB could stop paying members to set up for events. LGBTQA doesn’t pay its members to set up for the Drag Show. PRSSA didn’t pay members to set up for the Goodwill Fashion Show. Why should members of CAB be any different? Eliminating student pay is an easy way to save money in a so-called tight budget, rather than pass the debt on to students.

Or, CAB could’ve considered eliminating one night of a less-popular event – an unknown live band, for example – to have covered the cost of midnight breakfast.

At the same time, it’s been mostly freshman who’ve been going to midnight breakfast so far this year – mostly because freshmen don’t know any better. They don’t know the joys of free midnight breakfast.

Senior Dan Carver, student-body president, even said during an interview with The Simpsonian that he expected mainly freshmen to show up at midnight breakfast. Eventually, those freshmen CAB is counting on will learn, and no one will go to midnight breakfast anymore. And, possibly, this beloved Simpson tradition will slowly fade away, all because of CAB’s “tight budget.”