Saturday Campus Events Overlap

The 125-year-old holiday commemorating the start of construction on the first campus building is always held Oct. 12.

But this year the celebration will have to compete for attention with senior class registration and one of the football season's most highly anticipated games -- that against N.C. State.

University Day events begin at 9:30 a.m. with a keynote address in Hill Hall and continue with the 11 a.m. dedication of the newly constructed Institute for Arts and Humanities at Hyde Hall.

Thirty minutes after the keynote address's start, seniors will flood Student Central to register for their spring semester classes. With thousands of students logging on to schedule classes at once, Student Central often is slow to respond. In the past, the process has taken students up to two hours to complete.

But two hours after registration opens -- and one hour after the Hyde Hall dedication starts -- a sellout crowd will fill Kenan Stadium for the big matchup against local rival N.C. State.

The time conflict with the football game was unavoidable because the Atlantic Coast Conference set the schedule, Department of Athletics officials said.

But UNC-CH administrators moved up the opening ceremony to accommodate the traffic congestion associated with the game, said Provost Robert Shelton.

Starting the ceremony early in the morning will help ensure that all activities, including the 11 a.m. dedication, finish on time, he said. "The really difficult part comes in getting everything wrapped up early enough for kickoff at noon."

Attending both the University Day ceremonies and the game leaves little time for students to register for classes, but seniors can find a way to manage the time, said Student Body President Jen Daum. She plans to forgo the morning registration to attend the ceremonies.

University officials are not sure how the time conflicts will affect student turnout for University Day, but they are hoping for a large crowd, Shelton said.

"If there were no game, students would being doing different things -- maybe even going home," he said.

Sue Estroff, Faculty Council chairwoman, said the scheduling conflict will change faculty members' plans as well.

For commuting faculty, the 9:30 a.m. time is inconvenient, Estroff said. "There's a reason we don't have classes on Saturday," she said. "The faculty doesn't like it any more than students."

Estroff said that despite the conflicts, she hopes students and faculty will attend. "This is the day we celebrate the University for its own sake," she said. "We are the University. There are buildings, but without (students) and without (faculty) there is no University."

The University Editor can be reached at udesk@unc.edu.