Cedars, February 2018

by Rebekah Erway and Rachel Downs T he Oxford English Dictionary defines a “date” as “an appointment or engagement at a particular time; esp. a social activity or meeting with a person in whom one has a romantic interest.” In their terms, then, a date could be any sort of activity that a person purposefully schedules with the someone that person has a crush on. Ce- darville University students, however, have a different defi- nition. For them, the dating location is just as significant in classifying a date as the act of a planned get together. Of the 642 students who took the Cedars dating poll, only 15 percent said they’d prefer to go on a date on campus. Of the others, over 30 students said that dating on campus is entirely out of the question. “Cedarville doesn’t have ‘date spots’ unless you want to be extremely awkward or break rules,” a sophomore female said. Survey responses to the question “where on campus would you go on a date?” included comments such as “Off Campus,” “Never on campus,” “What” and “Canada or pos- sibly Xenia.” “None of these [survey options] counts as a date,” an- other sophomore female said. One senior female, while de- clining to call routine campus activities dates, admitted that there could be some acceptable dates on campus. “If you feel like you have to stay on campus, at least go to an activity like ALT night or ice skating,” she said. “But Chuck’s, I repeat, Chuck’s with someone of the opposite sex is not a date. Come on Cedarville, let’s get a little classier.” Of those who did admit that campus would be an ac- ceptable place to date, over a dozen liked a walk or a walk around the lake as a date. This feedback further solidifies the Cedarville culture’s thrice-around-the-lake theory, de- fined as follows: “any male-female duo seen walking three times around Cedar Lake must be dating.” Others who mentioned on-campus date spots recom- mended going to a Cedarville event like a concert or a play. Rinnova was the resounding winner for on-campus date spots with a total of 334 votes, but other students were willing to settle for benches, lounges in academic buildings (or, as one student responded, “Apple mah dude”), dorms or the BTS, or just somewhere quiet and secluded. “Anywhere to get away from others,” a junior male said. Whether by the lake or in an academic building, some Cedarville students are more than willing to accept the Ox- ford definition of date being simply a planned activity. But even the students who are willing to accept that definition lean towards an off-campus date spot. February 2018 6 ANALYSIS Dating on Cedarville’s Campus Survey says, go elsewhere Graphic by Tasha Peterson