State Patty's Day
As most Penn State students know, this weekend is State Patty’s Day, an unofficial holiday celebrated by not only Penn State students, but students from all over the region. Over the past week, I’ve received many emails from club leaders and dorm supervisors, as well as warnings from teachers, to be very careful this weekend. Not being from Pennsylvania or the surrounding area, I never even hear of this holiday until I came to Penn State. I heard that there were many extreme measures going to be taken this weekend, and when I looked at the front page of The Daily Collegian this morning, the first article I read about was State’s Patty Day. The article is posted below:
The article above indicates some of the measures that police officers in State College will be taking to promote good behavior during the student created holiday that will take place this Saturday. This includes having police officers and undercover cops monitoring apartment hallways looking for underage drinkers and those committing disorderly conduct.
The target audience for this newspaper article is the student population at Penn State. Not only does the article report actual facts about what police will be doing this weekend to control State Patty’s Day, the article seems to serve another function: warn Penn State students. Many students are terrified of getting underages and disorderly conduct marks on their records. Not only are they in trouble at the time of their charge, but the offense is placed on their record. That doesn’t sound too hot and many students are afraid of these charges. I’ve overheard many students say they’re not even leaving their rooms and apartments for this reason alone. State college police play into the pathos of the students by increasing the amount of police presence to attempt to scare them from unwanted partying this weekend.
Also, this article evokes many emotions from its readers. While some students agree with the police, many are outraged in what they feel in an invasion of privacy. Regardless of what emotions readers have, this article serves as an information source to stay safe this State Patty’s Day weekend.
Over half of the underage citations given last State Patty's were to non-Penn State students. Tell your friends to be careful! I know Panhel has also given us dozens of rules and warnings for this weekend.. you won't be seeing me out though, I don't think, because I'm planning on staying in to study for my honors macro midterm. Can't wait! To all of you actually going out, though, be safe.
ReplyDeleteEven though this is my first State Patty's Day, I think it's going to be completely different than the previous celebrations I've heard about. Police and really cracking down, and most of the people who would host parties don't want to get in trouble, so there's less to do. The problem is that so many people expect this huge street party, and the population of State College is probably tripling as we speak. I'm just going to be babysitting all my friends all weekend, and I hope everyone else is safe and careful as well!
ReplyDeleteQuick cruise-through commenting:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.collegian.psu.edu/archive/2011/02/24/state_pattys_day_why_so_close_to_thon.aspx
This State Patties is going be a lot different than most of us freshman--and first state patty-ers--expected. My RA even sent us a warning email of the police and everything. The thing that's a bummer that Lauren points out is that it usually is non-PSU students getting in trouble! It wouldn't be fair to completely shut down this weekend to PSU students because of the faults of students that don't even go here. One of my friends is even paying taxis all weekend and sacrificing the expense just to not have to walk downtown place to place because of the 1,000 expected undercover cops and the supposed "sobriety" tests randomly downtown. Everyone should really lay-low and be safe and basically if anyone has friends coming up, tell them especially to be careful.
ReplyDelete