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Lottery will decide who gets tickets to Clinton
by Jacob Kamaras
Senior Editor
News | 10/23/07
Posted online at 9:45 PM EST on 10/22/07
/ Last updated at 6:16 AM EST on 10/22/07
Tickets for former President Bill Clinton's speech will be distributed through a lottery system on the Brandeis Web site, University spokeswoman Lorna Miles said.
Clinton will speak Dec. 3 in the Shapiro Gymnasium in the Gosman Sports and Convocation Center at 1:30 p.m. in honor of the late Eli Segal '64, in whose honor a new Citizen Leadership Program in the Heller School for Social Policy and Management was established.
Students will be sent an e-mail on Oct. 30 with a link to a page on the Brandeis Web site explaining how to register for the lottery. Students have the opportunity to enter the lottery until midnight of Nov. 4. Students will be randomly chosen to receive tickets, and those chosen will be notified through an e-mail Nov. 13, Miles said.
The lecture is open to current Brandeis faculty, staff, students and trustees only, according to the Web site.
A lottery system was chosen to distribute tickets for Clinton's speech "because we have fewer seats than we probably have people who want to come," Miles said.
Miles said she wasn't yet sure how many tickets will be available for students through the lottery, but explained that the number of seats for the event will be similar to the roughly 1,700 available at former President Jimmy Carter's speech last January, also held in the Shapiro Gym.
Over 1,000 students waited in a line inside, that spilled outside the Shapiro Campus Center last January for tickets to Carter's speech, but Miles said that a new randomization system developed by Library and Technology Services enables the University to avoid a similar distribution process for the Clinton event.
"[LTS] has up-to-the-minute information and the ability to do randomization within different groups of students, faculty and staff by machine rather than us trying to do it by hand," Miles said.
Some students expressed concern that distributing tickets via lottery will be an unfair system.
Ryan Heisler '10 said he's worried that those who are most passionate about Clinton's visit might end up not going, while less enthusiastic people will win tickets.
Clinton will speak Dec. 3 in the Shapiro Gymnasium in the Gosman Sports and Convocation Center at 1:30 p.m. in honor of the late Eli Segal '64, in whose honor a new Citizen Leadership Program in the Heller School for Social Policy and Management was established.
Students will be sent an e-mail on Oct. 30 with a link to a page on the Brandeis Web site explaining how to register for the lottery. Students have the opportunity to enter the lottery until midnight of Nov. 4. Students will be randomly chosen to receive tickets, and those chosen will be notified through an e-mail Nov. 13, Miles said.
The lecture is open to current Brandeis faculty, staff, students and trustees only, according to the Web site.
A lottery system was chosen to distribute tickets for Clinton's speech "because we have fewer seats than we probably have people who want to come," Miles said.
Miles said she wasn't yet sure how many tickets will be available for students through the lottery, but explained that the number of seats for the event will be similar to the roughly 1,700 available at former President Jimmy Carter's speech last January, also held in the Shapiro Gym.
Over 1,000 students waited in a line inside, that spilled outside the Shapiro Campus Center last January for tickets to Carter's speech, but Miles said that a new randomization system developed by Library and Technology Services enables the University to avoid a similar distribution process for the Clinton event.
"[LTS] has up-to-the-minute information and the ability to do randomization within different groups of students, faculty and staff by machine rather than us trying to do it by hand," Miles said.
Some students expressed concern that distributing tickets via lottery will be an unfair system.
Ryan Heisler '10 said he's worried that those who are most passionate about Clinton's visit might end up not going, while less enthusiastic people will win tickets.
Viewing Comments 1 - 3 of 4
Meritocrat
posted 10/23/07 @ 9:00 AM EST
This is patently unfair to the Brandeis student body that cares. Those who care most about Clinton's visit should have the opportunity to compete.
Just like the Housing lottery system, the University will be turning to an arbitrary way to figure out who is allowed to go to this historic event. (Continued…)
Justin
posted 10/23/07 @ 10:15 AM EST
good article.
However, Lorna Miles is NOT a University spokesperson. She is the Senior Vice President for Communications and reports directly to President Reinharz. (Continued…)
Rebecca
posted 10/23/07 @ 12:58 PM EST
Yet again, alumni are excluded from the Brandeis community. Wonder why the endowment is so small.
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