Remember playing the board game Monopoly as a kid and how much fun it was to have that big wad of money to spend on whatever you wanted?

There was always the real stingy kid who bought up all the railroads and utilities. Then you had the one kid that went broke right away, buying up every property in sight. Then there was the patient youngster who saved all their money, hoping they’d land on Park Place or Boardwalk.

But then there was that fourth kid. You know, the sly one named Bobby who always stole money from the bank when no one was looking. He was the kid you had to keep your eye on. He was the kid that would cut some corners to get what he wanted.

Yes, those were the good old days of playing with paper money and friends. But some Eastern students still get to play with a large wad of money, and it seems there are still some individuals out there who are cutting corners.

And these students aren’t cheating with just the $1,600 in orange, yellow, blue, green, pink and white bills you have in your hot little hand when you first leave Go. No, the four student senate members appointed to Eastern’s Student Senate’s Tuition and Fee Review Committee got to play with green – $292,200 in green bills, or roughly $29.20 per student in fee increases.

Now, the job of these students may not have been as fun as say, picking up that yellow community chest card and advancing to ‘Go’ and collecting $200. In fact, it was probably more like going directly to jail, because instead of buying up phony properties, they had the tough decision of divvying up $29.20 in fee increases among nine money-hungry university boards. Not a fun task to say the least, but they did it. And of course, not everyone was happy. There was no real way everyone could be. Requests made by the nine boards totaled between $39-40, so there was no way everyone was going to get what they wanted. Now, believe me, I don’t agree with many of the decisions the committee made, but I would stand behind their decision nonetheless. Just as three of those four kids are going to be sore losers when they go bankrupt, the four senate members on the Tuition and Fee Review Committee can’t please everyone.

However, the three other kids would have a reason to be pissed off if little Bobby made it easier for himself to win by cutting some corners. Just as many, if not all, of those nine boards have a reason to be angry with the Student Senate, because like little Bobby, they didn’t follow the rules.

The Tuition and Fee Review Committee that made last Thursday’s recommendations was made up of four student senate members. However, senate’s bylaws require four Student Senate members, three students, two Faculty Senate members and two Staff Senate members to be appointed to the committee.

The three students appointed to the committee apparently didn’t show up Thursday, but the senate never even appointed anyone from the Faculty Senate or Staff Senate. So, the almighty powerful committee that made the fee recommendation to senate was made up of just four senate members itself, exactly what the governing body’s bylaws prohibit.

Whether the decisions the committee made were the right ones no longer matters, because the committee did not make those decisions in a fair manner. It’s the same as little Bobby buying the right properties to win Monopoly. He may have bought the right properties, but he shouldn’t win because he cheated. Whether they’ll ever admit it or not, the Student Senate cheated this university’s students, faculty and staff by not following the very bylaws it created to govern this committee.

Because the senate violated those bylaws, those decisions shouldn’t count and should be made over again, under the correct circumstances.

Little Bobby may have cheated at Monopoly, but you better be sure once his friends caught him, they made sure he never did it again.

Bill Ruthhart is a senior journalism major and a biweekly columnist for The Daily Eastern News. His e-mail address is [email protected]. Columns are the opinion of the author.