Alumni not guaranteed to receive football tickets

Are you graduating soon? Are you counting on alumni season football tickets to get you to all the home games the next few years? If you are, you may want to think about an alternative way to get into Beaver Stadium.

According to Bud Meredith, Penn State athletic ticket manager, there is a three- to four-year waiting list for alumni season tickets. As a result, even if you make the necessary donation (minimum of $100) to the University's scholarship fund by March 1, don't expect any tickets for the upcoming season to show up in your mailbox.

In fact, even if you donate for the next two or three seasons, don't expect any tickets.

Meredith says the cause of the backup is a combination of the large number of alumni and the lack of enough available seating. Currently, alumni are given between 3,000 and 8,000 tickets for each home game, depending on how many the opposing school requests. First priority for tickets is given to alumni who have donated money for the longest period of time.

Although this doesn't appear to be fair to new alumni, Meredith doesn't see it that way.

"It's fair," he said. "It rewards the individual who has been a long time donor."

In addition to this factor, the Nittany Lion Club, which runs the alumni season ticket process, takes several other criteria into account when deciding which alumni get tickets and where their seats are. Included is the amount of donation, whether the person has been a lifetime member of the Alumni Association and whether the person lettered in a varsity sport at the University Park campus.

Angelo Mariucci (senior-telecommunications) was one soon-to-be graduate upset by this ticket process.

"If you are donating money to the campus, you should be able to get tickets," he said. "It's only fair."

Mariucci, who plans to graduate in December, admitted he was unaware of the long waiting list.

Mike Rider (senior-finance) said he also didn't know much about the ticket process but that he doesn't plan on getting tickets after he graduates in May.

"I don't really care that much," he said. "I didn't really get (tickets) when I was here."

However, people like Mariucci who are interested in returning to Beaver Stadium to see the Lions can take solace in the fact alumni are given first priority for single-game tickets. Both season and single-game ticket applications will be mailed to those who qualify in late May.