As you are aware, there is the University Tower being built. The body of this article is an email sent to Mr. Brad Last, the vice-president of development. While I don’t think the email should be an article in and of itself, I think the points it raises should be brought to light to the student body. Just thought the school newspaper would like to know. Thank you.
Mr. Last,
My name is Bryan Adam. I am a student here at Dixie State University. I obtained my Associate of Science in 2012, transferred to Brigham Young University-Idaho for a year, transferred back to Dixie State University and am now planning on completing my Bachelor’s Degree in Biology here at Dixie State in May of 2015. I have been awarded the Chancellor’s Scholarship since my acceptance to Dixie State College back in fall of 2008.
The University Tower has been under construction for the past several months. I’ll be honest, from the moment I learned that it will be constructed I was against it. I felt it was in an awkward space on campus, unneeded, and a waste of money. However, I have recently been informed of the actual estimated cost of the Tower. According to fox13now.com the Tower’s estimated cost, back in Feb of 2014, was $1.2 million. One-point-two million dollars. $1,200,000. I just have to ask the question: Why? Why is this tower necessary for our campus? Why did the approval committee feel that it was OK to approve of a $1.2 million price-tag on said tower? Did we not just build the beautiful Holland building right next door? Did we not just improve our old library to become the new Snow Science and Math Center? Don’t we already have a clock that rings every hour? I’m sure the tower will be nice, but didn’t we just build two new things to beautify and improve our campus? Could this vast amount of money not have been used in a more instrumental way?
“But wait, Bryan,” you may say. “You don’t know the cost of buildings, or college, and this is a relatively cheap thing that will beautify our campus and celebrate our College becoming a University.” And while that may be true, let me explain something that I do know.
According to the Dixie State University website, in-state tuition costs a little more than $2000 a semester and we have a little more than 4,000 full-time, degree seeking, resident students. I’ll even round up and say we have 5,000 full-time, degree seeking, resident students (this rounding to account for both the little higher cost than $2000 and little more than 4,000 students). Let me reiterate in saying that tower has an estimated cost of $1.2 million. With that $1.2 million dollars you could have funded 500 students with full ride scholarships for a semester. That is 10% of the current full-time, degree seeking, resident students. You could have funded 250 for an entire year. You could have funded about 70 people for all four years of their education. You could have funded a combination of these options. Instead, we have a tower. A clock tower. Next to a brand new building and just down the way from a building that already chimes out the time.
This is not a letter of angst because I didn’t obtain a scholarship. As mentioned before I have a full ride scholarship here. This is, however, a letter of angst for those who didn’t receive one because of this tower. This is a letter of angst against using University funds on an unneeded, expensive tower, when we could have been using it to improve the buildings we will actually enter into at this brand new university (read: the old science building and the McDonald building).
Obviously, there is not a lot that can be done now. The tower is near semi-completion and there is no way to re-obtain those funds. However, in the future, I would like to see a greater sense of responsibility as you, and whatever other committee, use the school funds to improve the quality of higher education of this new University.
Thank you for your time. If you have any questions, comments or concerns please contact me at 435-772-5499. Thank you very much.
Sincerely,
Bryan Adam
