I am constantly reading articles in the Sundial about the lack of school spirit that is an evident and sweeping trend throughout our campus. I am in complete concordance that this is a major problem at our school. I am a huge Matador sports fan and I always find it rather sad that many of my fellow Matadors do not show their support for our student athletes by attending the plethora of home games they compete in. When sitting in the Matadome, I hate looking to my right and left and seeing nothing but empty bleachers all around me. I have to admit that when I happen to follow our teams to away games I become jealous of the huge amount of support the opposing team receives from their fellow classmates. I always think of how wonderful things could be at CSUN if only our students seemed to care.

I recently attended the 2005 SAC Tournament at UCLA, where our men’s volleyball team played against UCLA, USC, and UCSB. Two games were being played at the same time and of course I was watching our boys play UCSB.

About halfway through the first game, a Bruin fan happened to be standing right behind me and I overheard him talking on his cell phone: “Dude, you won’t believe where I am right now. I’m in the Student Activity Center where I’m watching a UCLA/USC game in one room and a UCSB/CSUN game in another room, and, believe it or not, CSUN actually looks pretty good.” I really had to stop myself from blurting out the first thing that came into my head after I heard the ridiculous statement that came out of this boy’s mouth.

Did he not remember the fact that our men’s team beat UCLA last April in what I would have to call the most exciting men’s volleyball game I have ever seen? Nevertheless, I was incredibly hurt by this boy’s comment. For this Bruin to say (in a rather surprised manner nonetheless) that we looked “halfway decent”, was truly disconcerting.

But then sadly I thought, maybe this Bruin has a point. How do I expect other schools to take our teams seriously when the majority of our own school doesn’t? How is it that the fans of the schools coming to play us outnumber our own Matador fans in the stands? How can this be? I truly don’t understand. Are people not proud to be attending CSUN or do they truly not care?

I really don’t know what can be done to change this enormous lack of school pride and school spirit. But what I can conclude is that there needs to be a desire for change in order for it to actually take place. And from where I’m standing (that is, in the empty bleachers at the Matadome) it seems that no one is in a hurry to fill in this massive void at our school.

Kelly Alisa Iannuzzi

Sophomore, Liberal Studies Major/ITEP