The College Fix

Upon reading my post regarding ticket packages for the 2011 BCS National Championship Game (the Ducks are playing, in case you didn’t know), UO VP for Student Affairs Robin Holmes had this to say:

It is unfortunate that things are being portrayed this way, but I can totally understand how folks feel. It is not true that we received the mass amount of tickets that folks think. Because the arena is so much smaller, we really did only receive a small amount of student tickets–it was just plain not enough.

Compared to the Rose Bowl distribution (they got 5800) our amount is paltry–but that’s the way it goes when you have 30,000 less seats in the arena. Also, all of the money that is loaded onto the tickets less the face value and is going right back into student activities associated with the Bowl game–none of it will be a profit to the University–I am happy to provide an accounting that will show
that when we settle up after the event. The travel agency that is handling everything for us does get a small profit from the sales of the tickets. Given how much time and effort they have put into this, the profit will not cover their time and resources. We could not have done it without them.

In terms of the Corvallis game and releasing the tickets too early that was our mistake. To be honest, we were so excited about finally being able to release the tickets, we used poor judgment and released them too early. Every student who contacted us and verified they were at the game and wanted to buy a ticket were allowed to do so. We are very excited about being able to put this opportunity together for students. It is our first time doing this, so we have a lot of learning to do. We are saddened that so many students were frustrated and hope to do better next time.

Lyzi Diamond blogs for and is the editor-in-chief of the Oregon Commentator.

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