<p>Son's an incoming freshman who has purchased his 2014-2015 Sports Pass. I'm not certain he knows how it works. I know I don't know how it works. Would someone please explain how he gets his tickets, etc. Thanks!</p>
<p>P.s. I've looked at the Sports Pass brochure (<a href="https://sports-admin.tamu.edu/mysportspass/docs/brochure.pdf">https://sports-admin.tamu.edu/mysportspass/docs/brochure.pdf</a>), and, perhaps I'm slow, but I'm still not certain how it works. </p>
<p>I’m definitely not experienced at this, and hopefully other more experienced folks will chime in, but my limited understanding is that, to get into a game, students who have the All Sports Pass (and I assume the Football Only Pass) use their A&M student ID and their reserved student ticket, which they pick up at Kyle Field on their assigned “pull day” during the week of the home game they want to attend. Your son should have gotten a sports card at Kyle Field during his NSC. He’ll use that and his student ID to pick up the reserved ticket on pull day Then he’ll use the ticket and his ID to get into the game. For freshmen, it looks like the pull day is Thursday, according to the brochure. </p>
<p>A lot of dorms have a group that pulls together. Try to get in with them because then you get better tickets. The Honors dorms have shifts for camping out ahead of time. They always got great seats!</p>
<p>We’re sort of big fans… so here’s how it works: Students get together with who they want to stand with at the game (they only sit while the other band plays at half time). At least one person stands in line on ticket pull day from your group and they will have all the sports passes of your group. You get to the ticket booth and they give you the same number of tickets that you have sports passes for up to a limit of 10 ( I believe). The tickets are specific to your spot in the stands (not general admission).</p>
<p>There is a 50% rule to determine the group status ( the day you pull ) for mixed year groups. Grad students, seniors, juniors, soph, freshman is the priority order. So if you have 3 juniors and 2 freshman in a group of 5, you pull on junior day – if you had 3 freshman and 2 juniors you pull on freshman day. IF you are in the Corps, your rules are different.</p>
<p>On game day students bring the ticket & their ID. Guests in student section (see below) just bring the ticket.</p>
<p>IF there are extra tickets you can get guest passes (that hasn’t happened very often) or you can use someone else’s sports pass to buy a guest ticket in the student section - you pay more for a guest sticker to allow you to enter the student section without a TAMU ID (non-student, sibling, parents can all use those tickets). We have experienced the game from the student side - it is amazing!!</p>
<p>A few more notes about football - the student sections are the entire two top tiers and about half of the bottom level. The other seats on the bottom level are sold to season ticket holders & the far corner is for the visiting team tickets. Alumni side is the opposite side of the field. The student side is extremely loud & should you get the opportunity to be on that side, they participate in all the yells & traditions that you will come to love. The entire stadium does yell, however the other sections do allow you to sit down during the game. Not too many parents are in the student section as it is tough to stand for the entire game at our ages! Most parents prefer other places in the stadium.</p>
<p>You can allow your sports pass to be used by other students or by guests with guest stickers. You can get reimbursed up to the value of your sports pass for that game - but not beyond that amount (that is a violation of the terms of your sports pass). They are now cracking down on the resale of passes for more than the allowed amount - although this year will probably not be the same frenzy for tickets like last year. Many students give their passes to their friends to use free of charge if they can’t make a game. Student sports passes are only good for tickets in the student section, if your student chooses to sit elsewhere in the stadium you will have to buy a ticket for them.</p>
<p>Thank God the “camping out” ritual has finally ended. S1’s grades would have been a lot higher if he hadn’t spend so many weeks “sleeping” at night in the ticket lines…sigh…it’s much better NOW.</p>
<p>A lot of Fish Camp groups will also pull together which is nice and helps the freshman ‘learn’ the system.</p>
<p>Well, I guess we shall see how the team does this year before we can claim the camping out is over! </p>
<p>Even if the team does well the camping has been cut down a lot. The placement in the stands is more random now, even if you show up early. It used to be the first people got the best seats, not it’s not necessarily that way, </p>
<p>They still camped out last year, even with the more random system. I think it doesn’t help when they had to limit the number of sports passes sold and had to sell partial home game football passes to allow incoming freshmen a chance to go to games. My oldest just graduated, last year by far was the most camp outs for her over her 4 years. Although the students seemed to really enjoy the experience, adding to the fun of the whole football season. They were a bunch of happy campers ;)</p>
<p>Maybe she just thought it was fun and continued to do it. </p>
<p>As chaos said above, the process is different now. It’s not as necessary anymore since the placement is random.</p>
<p>My D says her group still plans to camp out. I’m pretty sure it’s not just about ticket placement and is a kind of social gathering event! </p>