In Spring 2024, Queens College students voted to eliminate the $40 shuttle bus fee and redirect the funds to athletics and other student services. 92% of students voted in favor of the reallocation of funds according to an email sent to students by Vice President for Student Affairs Jennifer Jarvis. This was due to the low ridership and reliability issues of the bus.
The funding was reallocated to areas such as athletics, student government, the College Association, welcome day/orientation and student programming.
For the men’s soccer team, the additional funding has brought visible improvements. David Oprea, a senior from Norway who joined the program in 2022, has witnessed the effects firsthand.
“The vans we had in my first year — terrible,” Oprea said. “They were old, tight, [the] A/C wasn’t really working.” But he noted that conditions have improved. “We got new ones which are great. They’re bigger [and] more comfortable.”
Alongside the improvements, Oprea mentioned the success of the program throughout the years.
He pointed to a number of achievements: In his first year, the team made the NCAA tournament for the first time in program history. The second year, they won the conference for the first time. The third year, they secured the first seed in the regular season. In addition, another player, Harry Cooke, broke the program’s single-season scoring record.
Oprea credited some of their success to better resources. “Better gear—look good, feel good, play good,” he said.
However, not all students have felt the benefits of the funding. Ziad Elsayed, a sophomore Computer Science major who uses the QC fitness center, described ongoing maintenance issues.
“I will sit down and workout and the seat will fall off, and I have to stop my workout, pick the seat up, put it back, and continue,” Elsayed said. “When it falls off, everyone’s like ‘oh it’s okay, just put it back.’” Students have grown accustomed to the imperfections of the gym — so much so, they ignore the huge safety hazard and risk.
Elsayed suggested directing the focus to other neglected areas on campus as well.
He points to the library’s condition, explaining that it has been the same since he first enrolled at QC in Fall 2024. “There’s like sections of the library that are off limits, sections of the library that have caution tape on them.”
In the basketball gym, Jeremy Salvador, a junior Physical Education major, plays almost daily and mentioned that he usually brings his own ball because the school-provided balls for open gym are flat.
In addition, there is a room filled with basketballs in the gym. When asked about this room, Salvador said, “A few times they’ve had the door open with the balls but recently they’ve been keeping it locked.”
This issue also affects clubs. Morayo Adoumbou, president of the QC basketball club, said her organization has seen little impact.
Adoumbou mentioned the club uses the gym consistently for games and events, some in collaboration with other schools such as Columbia University.
She believes that club sports were not considered in the allocation of these funds in comparison to varsity teams.
Nearly two years after students voted to eliminate the shuttle bus and redirect its funding, the results are varied. For the men’s soccer team, new vans and better gear have accompanied a stretch of historic successes. But for club sports and general gym users, the promised benefits have yet to arrive in a visible or meaningful way.
In a statement given to The Knight News, Director of Athletics and Recreation Robert Twible addressed these concerns:
“While the Athletics Department has benefited from the reallocation of the shuttle bus fee by being able to support student staff and maintain facilities for student use – and is deeply grateful for the funding – it is premature to measure impact on team performance, student-athlete participation or facility usage, separate and apart from other factors. The support, however, is certainly important to our continuous efforts to provide robust programs and services.”
It’s deeper than this. Shawn rajkumar has proudly stated he’s been the reason that funding for the bus was allocated to the gym. Rajkumar has consistently went above and beyond an everyone’s back as he has close alliances with Jarvis and Eleanor Mavashev who secured him a job for the next year or so at queens even in the hiring freeze. He’s supposedly given full time while students all around struggle. Same president who smuggles alcohol in but everyone ignores it. What’s going on anymore? The buses still did some good for students. Anyone who’s been to the gym and seen the condition of our sports teams will understand money went to some other project. Want to get to the bottom of this? Hold SA and the administration accountable.