Group at A&M aims to rekindle bonfire tradition

By Sommer Bunce

The Battalion (Texas A&M U.)

COLLEGE STATION, Texas (U-WIRE) - At 8:30 p.m. at Texas A&M University's Corps Lounge A, Spence/Briggs residents will listen to speakers such as Tim and Janice Kerlee, parents of Bonfire collapse victim Tim Kerlee Jr.; head yell leader Ricky Wood and Rusty Thompson, assistant director of Student Programs for the Memorial Student Center.

The Kerlees met with a group of 50 Underwood residents Sunday night, said Underwood graduate hall director Jnanika Wijayarante. They plan to meet with students from Krueger on today.

The discussion will center on Texas A&M University's policy and the decision to place Aggie Bonfire on a two-year moratorium, said Spence/Briggs graduate hall director Tricia Schwery. Bonfire is a University issue that students want - and need - to know more about, Schwery said.

Keep the Fire Burning (KTFB), a student group seeking to build an off-campus bonfire to burn in late November, has been the main opposition to Bowen's decision.

Once Bowen announced his decision, all students should have respected it, Tim Kerlee Sr. said.

"I am violently opposed to the off-campus bonfire," he said. "It's a slap in the face of the Aggie spirit, and it disrespects the unity of that spirit. This gives a black eye to the Aggies."

Kerlee intends to share his opinion with other Southside residence halls.

"The students ought to do what has been recommended," he said. "Just because some are taking their bats off the field and vowing to play elsewhere doesn't mean we can't follow the guidelines the University gave."

Schwery and the Spence/Briggs Hall Council accepted Kerlee Sr., Wood and Thompson's offer to speak during resident adviser training early this semester.

"As a University official, I feel a responsibility to inform our students, to bring in the key players so students can form their own opinion to choose whether or not to participate (in KTFB's off-campus bonfire proposal)," Schwery said. "I want (the residents) to get a more realistic perspective of Bonfire."

Introducing a speaker like Kerlee Sr. helps bring about that perspective.

"To understand what it's like from the family perspective could totally change people's minds," Schwery said. "We're just thinking about being Aggies and carrying on the tradition that's been here for 90 years, but there's more to it than that. If something in your institution provides so much controversy and elicits so much emotion in people, then why do it? It's that way with the Aggie family."

"If this bonfire continues off campus, then it's going to drag people down and make things worse than they were in the beginning," she said.

Ricky Wood's position is simple: he is against an off-campus bonfire.

He said the point of speaking out against KTFB's proposed plan is to ensure that the Aggies stand as united as they did after the Bonfire collapse.

"The freshmen will be in charge of making sure that the Bonfire in 2002 is a good and safe one," Wood said. "We need to talk about what's going on and address the issues."

The people most strongly affected by the University's decision are the ones Schwery hopes to target in tonight's meeting.

"It's important to talk to freshmen," she said. "But more so, for the upperclassmen who worked their butts off last year - building stack and cutting down trees every weekend - with so much invested - who never got to see it burn."