The University Student Senate will throw a school-wide party next fall at a cost of $27,900. The party will be held on September 3, following the New School Block Party.
At an April 11 meeting, Co-Chair Nico Galvan and Mannes senator Jovan Bursac presented a proposal for the party- a summation of two years of work. After researching different venues, such as Webster Hall, Galvan and Bursac opted for Marquee, a nightclub on the corner of 10th avenue and 27th street. The capacity: 700 guests.
“We were lucky when we found Marquee,” said Galvan.
Renting out Marquee exclusively for New School students will cost $20,000, according to him.
“It’s about $7,500-$8,000 for bartenders, staff, lighting, videographer, photographer, and a complete staff for set up and breakdown,” he said.
According to Anara Askar, Student Senator at Parsons and Secretary of the University Student Senate, other venues were much more expensive.
“We tried to have one in the beginning of the year, the Party on the Pier, and it was sixty grand and it could only cater to 600 students,” said Askar.
The USS says the school-wide party is an attempt to address the complaint that The New School has no community.
“That’s one of the main complaints we do get,” Askar said. “‘We don’t have any community here. I don’t know anyone from Drama and I don’t know anyone from NSPE.’”
“The capacity of Marquee is 700, how can we ensure that 700 students will go out?” Galvan asked. “A couple of reasons were one: the name itself, Marquee, it’s a big brand name, it’s huge. Two: the date that we have is right after the Block Party, two hours later.”
Galvan also proposed selling tickets at a cost of $5-$15 on a rollout basis to ensure that students who RSVP’d would attend the event.
“What I personally will be arguing is for the first 100 or so are going to be free, the following 100 or so will be $5, the following 250 or so will be $10, etc,” he wrote on The Free Press Facebook.
Previous plans to have a celebrity performer have been ruled out due to cost analysis, but Senators said it was possible that they would choose a New School student performer based on Battle of the Bands performances during the Dawn of Summer event taking place at the University Center on May 1st.
“A string quartet may not be the most suitable in a club environment so we’re looking for someone who will get students dancing.” said Galvan.
Galvan and Bursac hope that the administration will provide funding to compensate the student performers.
Despite the majority vote, students at New School for Social Research were not in agreement with the party, telling senator Bryce Geyer they did not want to be involved with spending money on a party.
“Geyer was talking to his constituents and they were like, ‘No, no no, we are not voting for this party,” said Askar. ”This can happen but remove NSSR from it because we want our student fee that we pay every year to go towards academic events rather than parties’.’”
According to a breakdown of the budget presented at the April 10 meeting, the agreement agreement give $3,375 back to NSSR for the party is still pending. This number represents the estimated total amount that NSSR student paid towards their Student Senate fee.
The USS has yet to confirm whether NSSR students will be allowed to attend the party.
