Leave at 11:30? Really?:By Nia Newton

           My friends always seem bewildered when I tell them that I cannot have guys in my room before six and after eleven thirty. Most of my friends go to predominantly white schools, where the rules about visitation are limited and scarce. So why does Spelman have this rule? It beats me. Spelman College should have less restrictive visitation rules in order to teach students responsibility, give the students what they pay for, and to treat each student as an adult.
          Every male visitor must be out in the dorm lobbies by 11:25 to check out. There are no exceptions. Many who support these regulations would say that it is better for the students because it gives the women a limit on the time they have to fool around instead of study. I believe this regulation babies the students who attend Spelman College. As young adults, we have to be responsible. We should be able to have guests until a much later time as long as we are respectful of our roommates and our neighbors. We must use time management wisely.
         10,000 dollars is a lot of money to pay for living expenses, even more than it would cost to live off campus. As first and second year students, we are forced to live on campus, and forced to pay the housing fees. If a student is paying 10,000 dollars for a room, then that student should have the option to have guest in that room whenever she feels. I feel that 10,000 dollars is an efficient amount of money to pay for the freedom to do what you want with your space.
         As I have stated a large amount of times in this commentary, we are all adults. Almost all of us are 18 and older. We are away from home and should not be treated like little children who need curfews and limitations, we should be able to act freely and know what the consequences are going to be. Telling a student that they have to be on campus by 11, must have all visitors out by 11:25, or must be asleep at 12 is being a second parent. Yes, as a college community, we want the best for our students, but we cannot force grown adults to do what they do not want to do. As adults we should have the right to do as we please.
        I do not see anything wrong with striking the visitation rules. Other schools have free visitation and all of them run perfectly fine. Harvard, NYU, and Columbia are all elite schools with no restrictions on visitation. There is no reason why Spelman women cannot handle the freedom or obtain the freedom of timeless visitation. Spelman can keep a hold on things without suffocating its students.

Commentary..

What you have to understand Nia is that the majority of your friends who attend White schools are living in an environment suited and understood for White people. Instead of condemning Spelman for the visitation rule, thank them for looking out for you as an African American woman. The statistics of pregnancies before marriage is far greater in the African American community than it is the White community, partially because of the lack of sex education from parents and schools. If you are attending a White school, obviously you are going to have less restrictions on male visitation because young adult pregnancies are topics less discussed, less prevalent, and of less concern in the White community. However, you would probaly not have as many males you would want to visit you if you were at a White school anyway! : ) Im not attacking you, but rather making, in my opinion, the valid point that there are so many other positives to look and observe at that qualify Spelman as one of the best schools in the Nation. First off, your attending the top HBCU in the country, Spelman is a school all about sisterhood so you have at least 2000 girls that will always have your back, and being at a HBCU gives you the privelege of being embraced, not just tolerated as a statistic. So, yes, you could go to a White school and have male visitors till six am in the morning, but being honest with yourself is it really worth it to sacrifice all the other positives of Spelman College and the HBCU life? In my opinion, no. There is PLENTY of time for male visitation and all that may come with it. But for now, enjoy the time with your friends, your 36 thousand dollar education, and your overpriced books. At the end of the day, your future job interviwer will not ask you how long males visited your room but rather what organizations you were active in, what networking you did, how high your grades were, etc. The answers to all these questions will be better because you took a few more hours to be productive than spending it with a boy. As Black women, we will NOT be looked at the same in ANY interview as the WHITE girl sitting next to us. So, although she may have gotten unlimited visitation and have a lower GPA than you, there is the chance that shell STILL get picked over you. As a Black woman, there is just no time to play around, especially not in College. Do all you can do to make it as far as you can because the White girl who got her visitation does not have to worry about the job interviewer turning up his nose at her. In the world, we will be treated harder, thus, Spelman must be harder on us to ensure we are prepared to the best of our ability. I love you my Spelman sister!