Shaggy didn’t even come in the top ten for votes, but he’ll still headline Manhattan College Spring Fest

Back in November, Manhattan College Student Engagement reached out to students through their Instagram accounts, testing the popularity of various artists to see who we would prefer to have at our upcoming annual Spring Fest.  Their account posted 40+ pictures of comedians and singers alike, and we were asked to vote by “liking” the picture.

Us, being the naive millennials we are, figured that whoever received the most “likes” (or close to it) is who we would be seeing this April. It soon turned into a full-on bloodbath to make sure we got the right person this year. Fake Instagram accounts were made, and people began campaigning for their favorites (all the free time, I know…).

On March 21st, the Manhattan College Quadrangle confirmed rumors that Grammy Award-winning singer Shaggy would be taking the stage for our Spring Fest this year.  Shaggy was, in fact, one of the 40+ options that Student Engagement presented to us, but he didn’t even come within the top 10 when it came to votes.

So now, here we are, left confused, disappointed and wondering what happened to all of those amazing artists that we were presented with last semester.  We were all like wide-eyed kids in a candy store, wondering how we could just have one of these amazing acts.

Here are the top 10 vote-getters from the Instagram poll (based on likes) held last November:

10th) Ice Cube

9th) Post Malone

8th) OK Go

7th) Jeremiah

6th) TY Dolla $ign

5th) DJ Snake – 413 votes

4th) G-Eazy

3rd) Steve Aoki

2nd) Juicy J

1st) The Chainsmokers (Hey, we can dream)

So no, Shaggy didn’t even make it into the top 10 when it comes to most votes. But let’s be honest. It was always extremely unlikely that any of these top 10 would have ever made the trip to Manhattan College, to perform to a little over 4,000 students who won’t even remember it the next day.

I asked some MC students what they thought about the choice for this year’s Spring Fest, and got a similar response from almost everyone:

Eileen Becerra, 20, Business

“Why do they make us vote if they don’t pick the person with the most votes?”

Kelly Shannon, 20, Education

“Would’ve been cool 10 years ago…But it’s still pretty cool. He’s probably the most famous person they could’ve gotten. He’s also my mom’s age which is pretty weird…”

Ally Palmisano, 19, Engineering

“I never heard of the guy.”

Personally, I don’t have a problem with Shaggy coming for Spring Fest ’17, and I also like the fact that Student Engagement is asking our opinions before making a final decision.

But maybe for next time, let’s keep the options in a reachable zone, so we won’t get hyped up only to be (semi) let down.