About 50 students attended a rally yesterday in front of Old Main to celebrate the return of the first-come, first-served football ticket distribution system, a far cry from the hundreds expected to turn out to protest the university's short-lived decision to change the system.

"This is an all right turnout, I guess," PSU Stop President Gavin Keirans joked with the crowd.

Speaking from Old Main's steps, Keirans told the scattered crowd that Penn State students need to realize the significance of the last two days.

"It's something like this that might be a wake-up call to students that the administration does strip us of rights," Keirans told the crowd. "It's important that you know if you get 6,000 students in a Facebook group, the administration is going to listen."

The rally was originally planned to protest the athletic department's decision to switch to a lottery system for the distribution of student section football tickets. Hundreds of students joined the rally's Facebook event within hours of its creation. When the administration abruptly reversed its position Wednesday, rally sponsor and Safeguard Old State co-director Tom Shakely decided to change the focus of the rally to a "celebratory" and "back-patting" event, congratulating students for making change happen.

University Park Undergraduate Association (UPUA) President Hillary Lewis was among the speakers present. She called the reaction to the lottery a sign that "apathy is disappearing," and pledged UPUA's support in future activist ventures.

"Remember," she said, "we are Penn State, and we are unique."

The scattered crowd included sign-toting supporters of "Real Life Choices," a sexual assault awareness program normally held during the First-Year Testing, Counseling and Advising Program (FTCAP). University officials decided last month to remove the program from FTCAP, replacing it with a seminar on adjusting to college.

"Incoming freshman students face the highest risk of being sexually assaulted in their first six weeks," Brittany Reutzel (sophomore-communication arts and sciences and women's studies) said. "We are fed up with not have a voice in decisions that affect the student body."

Keirans said he hopes the student body's taste of activism in overturning the ticket lottery will leave them hungry for more.

"How about we unite around tuition?" Keirans said. "I love football, but I feel like paying a ridiculous amount for tuition might be a slightly bigger issue."

Shakely disagreed, calling tuition a "nothing topic."

"How do you rally around tuition?" he asked. "How do you fix tuition? You can't."

He suggested that students "focus on tangible issues."

Keirans said it would be the prime initiative of PSU Stop to hold more events like the rally and encourage students to involve themselves in university matters.

"This is a great step to fight student apathy, but you have to excite students about other issues," he said. "We could make so much change here in a year if every student stopped walking by and started uniting."