According to the U.S. News and World Report, Biola is now a Top-Tier National University — a top-tier national university that doesn’t have an events center. How does this make sense? Biola is one of the top, if not the top, Christian liberal arts universities in the U.S., and yet we do not have a space that can hold the events we host.
NEED FOR BIGGER EVENT SPACE
I work as the religious lectures coordinator in Associated Students, and I can tell you that finding a space big enough to accommodate large-scale events on Biola’s campus is nearly impossible. Metzger Lawn is off-limits because the city of La Mirada is full of grandmas that go to sleep at one in the afternoon, the gym is nearly impossible to get because athletics are a precious commodity not to be touched and now even smaller outdoor venues are starting to be limited in use.
Last fall, when Mat Kearney came to Biola and performed on Metzger Lawn, complaints started coming in the early afternoon during the soundcheck. Maybe our neighbors all enjoy a communal one o’clock nap?
You may be asking, why not just get the gym? Between the hold that athletics has on Chase Gymnasium and the red tape as thick as the Grand Canyon, booking a time slot to use the gym is about as likely as Michele Bachmann getting elected as president.
Now the use of outdoor venues, such as the Fireplace Pavilion, is limited. I am bringing in a New York Times best-selling author to close out my “God, Where Are You in Culture?” series on May 1. Unfortunately, the Pops Concert is the next day, so I have been told that facilities cannot set up for both events. The solution? Biola’s current version of an events center, Sutherland Auditorium, because of the minimal set-up needed. Am I the only one that realizes this will be an embarrassment for the university?
NO IMMEDIATE PLAN FOR FUNDING
An events center is in the 10-year plan with no immediate plan to be funded, and that simply isn’t good enough. If we want to compete with schools like Azusa Pacific and Wheaton, we have to create a space that can allow us to accommodate the top Christian academics and speakers. Wheaton not only has a Sports and Recreation Complex, complete with the 2,650 seat King Arena, they also have Edman Chapel, where 2,400 seats are dedicated solely to chapels, concerts and various other events. APU is also way ahead of Biola, with the 4,000 seat Richard and Vivian Felix Event Center.
Biola has a usable science building, therefore the new science building should not be a top priority. Instead the university should be focusing its efforts in a direction that has been ignored for far too long.
How are we going to continue to draw students to our university if our facilities are second grade?
I have heard that a big reason that the events center has no immediate plans to be funded is because Metzger doesn’t believe that Biola’s donors will fund the project. If this is true, it’s unfortunate. Most of the people in Metzger that make the decisions are not planning events for the university, and therefore they clearly do not understand the predicament those of us that do have been placed in.
To be named a top-tier university brings a certain burden to prove that the title was not given in vain. Until Biola takes the long-awaited step of creating a fully functional events center, the university has not earned that title. Until Biola University has a first rate events center, we will remain a second rate university.
