Staff Editorial: Timing of Devil's Eve off

Friday's Devil's Eve celebration proved the old axiom--timing is, indeed, everything. Despite a strong performance by the band "Appetite for Destruction," beer on points, a magician and a host of other food and games, the carnival was poorly attended. The decision to hold the carnival on Halloween night was a mistake.

The logic behind holding Devil's Eve on Halloween was to give those students who either could not or did not want to leave campus Friday night an inexpensive and fun on-campus alternative. Although the Campus Council members' hearts were in the right place, they were being unrealistic, and sold themselves, and the rest of the Duke community short. Devil's Eve is supposed to be a campus-wide celebration that draws a large segment of the student population. Campus Council had to have been cognizant of the fact that a great number of students would leave campus to attend events like the sorority mixer at Shooters and the traditional Franklin Street Halloween bash. It was imprudent of Campus Council to host such a major on-campus event for only a limited portion of the student body. At times, there were as few as 20 people listening to the band. Campus Council should have expended the money and the effort required to set up the carnival on a night when more students could reasonably have been expected to attend. This is not to say that the University should refrain from providing alternatives to off-campus events. However, large-scale events like Devil's Eve should be designed to cater to the entire student population.

In addition, hosting a major on-campus event on the same night as the Franklin Street Halloween event seems to go against the common theme that students should "break out of the Gothic bubble" and experience the culture outside Duke's walls. The Franklin Street spectacle is renowned as a must-see event, and is a major part of the Durham/Chapel Hill college experience.

Though the carnival did not meet expectations in terms of student turn-out, the students and employees responsible for conducting the event itself should be commended. Those students who did attend enjoyed the games, and the addition of alcohol on points was managed safely and added to the experience.