Heed my words, Athletic Department, for I offer you the only solution to what amounts to a clumsy, onerous, egregious, and, dare I say, elitist seating policy in the Kohl Center. Like some sort of performance-enhancing, drug-dealing sports pharmacist, I proffer you a prescription for what ails your underperforming seating policy. The men's basketball student section has a fever, and the only prescription is vouchers.

While the ticket lottery itself benefits from the fairness of a set of criteria that includes year in school and number of times applying for tickets, its utility stops there. Applying those same criteria to where a student sits once he or she has survived the lottery is folly.

The current UW men's basketball student section seating policy rightfully rewards those students who have faithfully applied for tickets year after painstaking year. However, the current system wrongfully rewards those students who selectively craft an elitist group of upperclassmen who have had the wherewithal to apply for tickets every year. It further consigns less fortunate ticket holders to wallow in their 3rd tier seats for the entirety of the season. In this way, the current seating policy serves to handcuff students to a specific section for the entire year, with little hope of ever viewing the game from another, perhaps more advantageous vantage point, and precludes the chance to sit next to a variety of friends and acquaintances.

With all due respect to the eclectic and vibrant group of fans who fill out our student section, I like the flexibility of being able to sit with different or even the same group of friends even if I was somehow unable to get into their initial group. The current seating system has within it no room for variety. Such a system does not allow for the spontaneity of the football seating policy, which allows for students to pick and choose acquaintances or friends whom they wish to sit next to, or areas they would like to sit in, by simply showing up with said acquaintances to any given game at a certain time.

Perhaps you are one of those poor souls who somehow beat the odds and procured student tickets for the basketball season. Half season or full, you dreamed of Marcus Landry dominating opposing defenses with spectacular, acrobatic dunks. You dreamed of beholding firsthand Greg Stiemsma playing at a level consistently commensurate with the flashes of emotion and dominance he has so coyly exhibited at moments through his tenure. You looked forward to joining in the disparaging chants hurled at teams foolhardy enough to dare set foot upon the Kohl Center's hallowed hardwood. You anticipated being able to question Michael Flowers on his mysterious "medical" leave via well-timed and amply shouted queries.

But somehow — perhaps you had too few points, or your friends' groups were all already full — you managed not to end up in a group of friends. Alone and destitute, you were forced to sell your tickets, your only solace the opportunity to watch the game with a group of friends while crowded around a TV blessed with Big Ten Network.

The biggest and most obvious foible of the current system is exactly this: How do you sit with who you want to sit with and choose remotely where you'd like to sit on a game-to-game basis? Were it not for a sophomore's inability to find friends who had won tickets and could commit to sitting next to them on a game-to-game basis, I'd be without basketball tickets. But even I was frustrated in my search for someone willing to accept my first-year-sophomore-standing applying for tickets status. By the time I had worked out arrangements to buy the tickets, my fellow seniors had already formed their groups. And I was left with few options, and began to wonder: how would this work with vouchers?

The voucher system allows for people who win tickets to sit with exactly who they want to sit with on a game-by-game basis. Imagine the freedom of being able to contact a friend in order to sit next to him or her. With voucher in hand, you can rest assured that you will find friends willing to show up at the Kohl Center extra early for the Michigan State game in order to procure front row seats, or stroll in during the third quarter for the Edgewood scrimma — er, exhibition game.

Further, vouchers allow for the most diehard of Wisconsin fans to get the most coveted seats, much as the ticket policy in years past allowed students to indicate their "fanness" by waiting in line for days for the best tickets in the student section. The Athletic Department's current policies indicate their desire to reward those diehard fans by giving them better seats and a better chance at tickets via their distribution and seating policy. But a voucher system does just that. With vouchers, the fans sitting in the front or near it are those who value the seats enough to ensure they are at the game on time.

Fairness? Convenience? Do those words describe the men's basketball seating section now? Hardly. But they could, if only the Athletic Department would take a lesson from their very own Camp Randall, where the voucher is used to great effect. If it works so well there, why not in the Kohl Center?

In the meantime, I guess I'll see you in the sophomore seats!

Gerald Cox ([email protected]) is a senior majoring in economics.