As students head into that happy place known as ""Spring Break,"" the sense of relief is practically palpable. Sleeping, partying and even homework are just waiting to be caught up on. Whether you're headed to Cancun, California or just your parents' basement, thoughts of campus will, with any luck, be driven far from the collective student mind.
Was some shady figure counting on that fact when Spring Break was moved back a week to swallow election day whole? Perhaps. What better way to eliminate the student vote almost entirely than to allow most of it to leave town? Conspiracy theorists campuswide have an open invitation to figure that one out.
Still, the absentee ballots are flowing in and thus the student-popular Mayor Dave Cieslewicz can likely breathe a sigh of relief. It's a common feeling these days. It may just be the warmer weather, but UW-Madison is feeling better all the time.
Even university officials seem to be surprisingly on the lookout for student interests in recent weeks. It was heartening to hear of the resounding ""Just Say No"" attitude in response to the Recording Industry Association of America's attempt to harass and sue UW Madison students for downloading music on campus. Unlike the many universities that chose to comply with the RIAA's extortionist scare-tactics, UW officials apparently hold the wacky belief that students time and money are better spent on tuition and schoolwork than paying off the Big Brother of the music industry. Maybe the administration has its finger on the student pulse after all.
Granted, mention the words ""affordable textbooks"" or ""sweatshop apparel"" and the whole apparatus dives back into the sand with an affronted hiccup, but a small step forward is better than nothing, and I think it bodes well for the future.
And just look at all the great things we've got going on around here. Tuition reciprocity between Madison and Minnesota appears to have dug in its claws for another couple of years, Liz Waters is finally co-ed and eventually there will be another Zombie Rights protest winding its way down State Street.
It's true, the price of college today is unconscionably high, but it does not seem that many students are regretting their choice to get a degree. Who would have thought that out of the middle of Wisconsin would come a learning institution to be reckoned with? Sure, diversity on campus isn't what it could be, but when the huge majority of your students come from the same relatively small part of the country, that's to be expected.
You know you're in an interesting place when student groups request both the Dalai Lama and Ann Coulter speak here. Madison may not be the bastion of liberalism that it once was, but we do keep the local authorities on their toes and there's certainly something to be said for that.
You may not care about the election, you may not care about class, you may not care about anything beyond getting the heck out of Madison for a week, but it will be here when you get back and it will be happy to see you.
And then it will be Mifflin time, and the whole thing will begin again ... because really? That's what it's all about.
