The fun is where
the friends are
Location doesn 't matter
nang out with tens of thousands of
drunk college students.
Tough choice?
No. Neither place appeals to me.
Neither do all the other popular
spring break sites.
Maybe it’s because I’m somewhat
appalled by people who need to be
drunk or around other drunks to have
a good time.
But, most importantly, it’s
because having fun on spring break
has nothing do to with where you go.
All that matters is who you go with.
I admit, some of the best vaca
tions I have taken were trips to
Greece, to Spain and to a sailing
camp in France.
But spectacular locations didn’t
make the trips great. The friends who
came along did.
Therefore, I would rather spend a
week with friends in western
Nebraska - in my opinion, the most
boring place on earth - than by
myself in Hawaii.
Spring break serves different pur
poses.
First and most importantly it pro
vides students with time to get away
from school, and I encourage every
body to do so.
So don’t stay in Lincoln. Go
somewhere - anywhere - as long as
you get a change of scenery.
Next, make sure you get some
rest during the break. If you don’t, it
will come back to haunt you before
and during finals.
Once you’re out of town, the per
fect vacation awaits you.
I’ll give you a few examples:
In Germany, we have a holiday
called “Pfingsten,” which is like
spring break, because we get a week
off of school about a month and a half
prior to finals and summer vacation.
Every year on Pfingsten, about
10 of my best friends and I would
KLAUS MARRE is a
senior broadcasting
major and a Daily
Nebraskan columnist
Spring break is just around the
comer, travel agencies are throwing
brochures at you, and ads in the paper
are offering, you unbelievable travel
deals.
You are still torn between
Daytona Beach and South Padre
Island, but you are certain this spring
break will be the best time of your
life. After all, eight to 10 days of
drinking and sexual adventures lay
ahead of you, and spring break is
what college is all about.
In order to make the best choice
for a spring break trip, consider the
advantages of these two locations.
In Daytona Beach, you could
hang out with tens of thousands of
drunk college students.
But in South Padre, you could
pack our things and take off to a place
in the hills about two hours away
from our homes.
Bleckhausen, the town we picked
as our annual destination, was
extremely boring (we actually were
the annual highlight for many of the
locals). And the house there did not
have any outstanding features.
But that’s not what made the trips
perfect.
The fun of these trips would start
weeks before we left.
Anticipation and planning, as
well as the memories of last year’s
adventures, were as much a part of
the experience as the time spent in
Bleckhausen.
Plus, every Pfingsten vacation
had a series of components which
can never be altered: beer, barbecue,
seemingly endless card games and an
annual trip to the top of the mountain
above our house.
A number oi rituals also were
involved, and they made the trips leg
endary at my high school.
The first ritual occurred just after
arriving, when we placed a single
sausage underneath the coals of the
grill. At the end of the trip, one lucky
guy got bribed to eat it. Normally, the
eater was my friend Jan, who would
eat pretty much anything, including
the deodorant stick he ate for $6 in
1992.
Another ritual started when we
ran out of beer while playing cards.
We found a David Hasselhoff
song on a compact disc (hello,
stereotype) and decided to play it
continuously until one of us couldn’t
stand it anymore. The person who
turned off the tune would have to go
and buy more beer.
But we underestimated our own
strength. The song ran for 14 hours
straight before we realized our own
stupidity and went to the store togeth
er.
Granted, almost all of these sto
ries are the “I guess you should have
been there” type, and I could go on
forever writing about anecdotes only
I could find funny.
But that’s my point.
Going somewhere - anywhere -
with your best friends creates memo
ries and bonds stronger and, most
likely, more fun than anything
Daytona Beach can offer.
Though I see my friends only
once a year, and we all have chosen
different paths, we still sit together
and share our Pfingsten memories.
And every time, it seems as if noth
ing has changed between us.
So, if you have yet to make spring
break plans, and you don’t want to do
what everybody else is doing ...
And if having a good time is more
important to you than saying you
have been to some exotic locale ...
Then I encourage you to find a
house somewhere within five hours
of Lincoln, get some friends together
and take off.
I promise, with the right friends,
you will not regret it
Plus, you’ll return to school phys
ically rested and mentally prepared to
face the last weeks of classes.
Leading, not lounging
Program helps students shine
By Lindsay Young
Assignment Reporter
Sixty UNL students will refuse to
relax in the sun or ski powdered slopes
during the seven-day recess from class
es this spring break.
Instead, they will spend six intense
days learning effective leadership
skills at The LeaderShape Institute at
Camp Carroll Joy Holling.
It’s worth the sacrifice, past partic
ipants said.
“I learned more in that one week
than I have in any other experience in
my life,” said Doug Kucera, a junior
international business and Spanish
major who participated in The
LeaderShape Institute last year.
“It beat the hell out of Padre,” said
Matthew Eickman, a junior finance
and economics major, adding last
year’s conference was better than going
on any trip.
The 60 students were chosen from
a pool of applicants to participate in
LeaderShape during spring break.
One-third of the group will represent
greek organizations, one-third will rep
resent residence halls and one-third
will come from off-campus housing.
This year’s group of students was
hard to choose, said Vernon Miller, a
member of the LeaderShape central
planning committee.
“After experiencing LeaderShape,
I wanted everyone to experience it,” he
said.
But about 25 students now sit on
the conference’s waiting list
Marilyn Bugenhagen,
LeaderShape campus program admin
istrator, said the conference helps cho
sen participants lead with integrity.
The conference is set up with a dif
ferent theme each day, including:
“Building Community,’’ “Staying in
Action” and “Bringing Vision to
Reality.”
To achieve leadership goals, stu
dents work in both large groups and
small “families,” which Eickman said
made the conference more effective.
The learning experience doesn’t
stop when the conference is over,
Miller said.
By the end of the LeaderShape
week, participants develop a vision for
improving the community ordhe
groups and organizations they lead,
and they decide how to turn the vision
into a reality.
For one year after the conference,
participants attend follow-up meetings
and activities in order to renew their
motivation to follow through on their
visions, Bugenhagen said.
“It’s definitely going to have an
impact on our campus,” Miller said.
Pasha Koiber, a senior mechanical
engineering major, attended
LeaderShape last year and created a
vision of improving the retention rate
among her fellow engineering stu
dents.
Koroer iimsfted her vision during
the first week of the fall semester, she
said. She spoke to all 400 incoming
freshman engineering students in their
introduction engineering seminar.
“I think I’ve opened some doors for
some freshmen,” she said.
Because the conference is set up
with a more personal focus than a tra
ditional leadership lecture, it is more
effective and more rewarding, said
Robert Sheehan, executive director of
LeaderShape, Inc.
Groups including University
Foundations, the office of Student
Affairs and academic colleges sponsor
students who attend the program. The
conference costs about $500 for each
student, but the students don’t pay a
dime.
More than 5,000 students have
gone through the program since it
beganin 1986.
The University of Nebraska
Lincoln is the only campus whose stu
dents attend the program during spring
66
Its definitely going
to have an impact
on our campus
Vernon Miller
planning committee member
break, Sheehan said, although 20 uni
versities will hold LeaderShape near
their campuses this year.
The University ofKansas holds die
program during its winter break, and
other schools hold the program during
the summer alter spring classes end.
Last year was the first year UNL
hosted the program. Before that, UNL
sent its LeaderShape students to one of
the seven sessions held at The
LeaderShape Institute’s base in
Champaign, 111.
Sheehan said he was excited when
he heard UNL wanted to conduct the
program during its spring break,
because the week is more productive
and positive for students than tradition
al spring break trips.
“I thought that was an exciting
innovation, he said. The whole idea
of an alternative spring break I find
appealing.”
At the end of spring break, most
students won’t end their trips with
tears.
But many LeaderShape partici
pants did.
It was hard to say goodbye to other
participants who they had grown close
to during the six-day workshop, they
said.
Eickman said these tears show the
conference has a large and lasting
impactonitsj
“Everyone
* tears in their eyes,”
how close you become with oofei
er.”
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