What’s with all the progress?

As the Editor-in-Chief of The Chanticleer, I like to keep my ears open when I’m around fellow students, always listening for issues bothering folks. One thing that comes up almost all the time is anger directed at the construction projects for one reason or another. Whether it is that they’re taking away parking, or blocking students’ shortcuts and forcing detours to class, or complaints that projects are overdue, almost everyone has some gripe with the multiple construction projects going on around campus.

Here’s the deal.

First off, we should be happy to see our little school putting such an effort into growing. It may not seem like it at times, but it’s all being done to enhance the student experience at Coastal.

To this one might say, “Hey Shane, I’ll be gone long before half this stuff’s done anyway!” To which I answer, me too, but you’ve got to think about the long run.

What makes a degree from one school seem better than the other? The school’s reputation. Even if you’re gone with a degree from CCU long before half these projects are done, it’s going to do nothing but make your degree more valuable when, in 10 or 15 years, CCU is on par with Clemson or USC.

Secondly, you can’t blame the school for delays in construction. That is one thing that’s almost completely out of the hands of school officials. By South Carolina’s procurement laws, any contract over $50,000 for a state-funded construction project has to go up for a bid from different contractors (the people that actually build the construction projects). The most common bidding procedure is competitive-sealed bidding in which the school HAS TO accept the lowest cost bid. This means sometimes we get stuck with contractors who aren’t as reliable or fast, and that slows down construction. It’s a frustrating thing, but it’s a law that ultimately protects taxpayers.

Lastly, as far as the whole parking or shortcuts thing goes, get over it! I don’t know how many of you have visited other major universities, but we’re blessed at Coastal to have parking as close as we do to school buildings. At Clemson, most lots are as far away from class as our whole campus is large. At USC, you have a whole city to cover. The bigger the school, the less parking, or the farther away parking is. Oh yeah, and while we’re on the subject, all those schools with far away or very little parking pay around double or triple the price for parking permits than CCU. At College of Charleston, it’s $400-600 per semester. Clemson is $134 per year. UGA is $180-360 per semester. But at Coastal, we complain over a measly $75 a year.

So, all things considered, the construction is good even if it may not seem so. Just think of it in the long run.

Norris is editor-in-chief of The Chanticleer, Coastal Carolina University’s student-produced newspaper.