As undergraduates get excited for the Fetty Wap concert approaching in April, graduate students and QU alumni will not be joining in on the fun.
Tickets to the Wake the Giant Spring Concert were released on Monday, Feb. 22 on the student ticket portal at 10 p.m. for undergraduate students. The Student Programming Board (SPB) had said graduate students would be able to generate tickets on Feb. 29.
However, after an almost instant sell-out during the first night of ticket sales, SPB said graduate students and alumni will no longer be able to score tickets to the show.
Mainstage Chair of SPB, senior Alex LaManga, said this was the first time the Wake the Giant concert has sold out on undergraduate tickets alone. She said, in the past, tickets were only available for graduate students and alumni because they did not sell out during the undergraduate sale.
In a statement released by SPB on Facebook, students were told undergraduates were the priority. This is because undergraduates pay a student activity fee for undergrad programming such as the concert, whereas graduate students pay a fee for graduate programming and needs.
“Undergrads are our first priority, they fund our budget, so we have to give it to them first,” LaManga said. “We’re required to give undergrad priority—any club or organization on this campus is—because the money that we get to put on the show comes from them.”
In the beginning, graduate students and alumni were asked to pay $25 for general admission and $30 for the floor, compared to $20 for general admission and $25 for the floor for undergraduate students.
“Tickets have always been more expensive for grads and alumni,” LaManga said. “We know that undergrad are the priority and we want the help them out as much as we can.”
However, LaManga believes a lot of graduate students and alumni do not understand why they were not able to generate tickets.
Joelle Paolino, an alumnae of Quinnipiac who graduated in 2013, said she wasn’t surprised the tickets for the Wake the Giant concert sold out.
“Fetty Wap is a big name right now and it’s great SPB was able to get him to play at QU,” Paolino said. “I really wanted to attend this concert and am disappointed that I will not be able to go.”
Despite wanting to go, Paolino said she won’t buy a ticket from someone selling one.
“I am not willing to pay more than the price that was listed,” she said.
But Paolino said even though she is upset she won’t be able to attend, she understands that current students take precedent over alumni.
Graduate student Emily Bean said graduate students and alumni were set up for disappointment. She is a part of the business 3 + 1 program, and is confused about the undergraduate priority. Since she is part of this program, her tuition has stayed the same since her freshmen year.
“Being in the 3+1 program, I pay the same amount of money to go here as I did as an undergrad so that reasoning doesn’t quite make sense to me,” Bean said.
Bean also said she thinks there is a lack of communication between SPB and graduate students.
Paolino said SPB has not reached out to the alumni to notify them that they won’t be able to try to purchase tickets.
“I have not gotten any type of information from SPB about alumni not being able to attend,” Paolino said. “I discovered that alumni cannot buy tickets from an undergrad who sent me the statement that SPB released.”
LaManga said the reactions have been intense, but that many might not understand the details.
“We have received a lot of angry reactions from grads and it’s totally understandable,” she said. “I think the anger does come from a misinformed place though. [Graduate students and alumni] don’t pay any fees.”
Due to the fact that SPB is in charge of planning and executing the spring concert, the organization got the short end of the stick, LaManga said. She said SPB has had to deal with things that are out of its control.
“It’s hard because SPB takes the brunt of it, but the decisions come from leadership,” she said. “The space is filled because of the TD Arena that Quinnipiac provides. We can’t switch venues … because of budget and security reasons. It’s hard because SPB has to deal with that but it’s not really SPB’s fault.”
LaManga said she and the rest of SPB want all Quinnipiac students to know they truly wish everyone could enjoy Fetty Wap’s concert.
“We just can’t accommodate everybody this year and we are so sorry,” LaManga said.
CORRECTION: This article was corrected on March 7 at 4:25 p.m. to say that graduate students pay fees for graduate programs, but not for undergraduate programs, such as the spring concert.
