4A
Friday, January 13, 1995
OPINION
UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
VIEWPOINT
THE ISSUE: STUDENT POLITICAL AWARENESS
Coalition needs student support
Today's students have become so cynical that it has basically given up trying to influence politics. But there is a group on campus working to change that.
The Kansas Student Votes Coalition, a fleedling but effective statewide student group, deserves campus-wide support.
The 29th annual survey by the Higher Education Research Institute at the University of California-Los Angeles found that student apathy about political involvement is indeed a reality. Only 31.9 percent of the 333,000 1994 fall freshmen the institute polled felt that keeping up with political affairs was a goal in their lives. This was an all-time low. The declining number of nonparticipants in elections should be cause for alarm.
This problem could be solved simply and expediently by creating permanent registration sites on all college campuses and by setting up polling booths for students to cast
The Kansas Student Votes Coalition, begun in 1994, is working to reverse student apathy and to help get students registered.
The Kansas Student Votes Coalition is now pushing for legislation that would mandate universities be made agencies for registration and voting. The coalition is circulating petitions on the campuses of Fort Hays State University, Kansas State University and Emporia State University as well as at KU.
absentee ballots for their respective precincts. These actions also would foster overall student political involvement.
Even in the current pit of political lethargy young adults have fallen into, the Kansas Student Votes Coalition has brought to light a feasible solution. With the support of the Kansas Legislature and the KU administration,the coalition can succeed in mobilizing students across the state to take an active role in politics.
AMY TRAINER FOR THE EDITORIAL BOARD.
THE ISSUE: STUDENT HOUSING FEES
Residence halls are threatened
The announcement that the Board of Regents approved housing fee increases for next fall comes unfortunately at a time when occupancy rates continue to drop.
Clearly, the Department of Student Housing needs to make substantial changes in the housing system.
Several complex issues cloud the debate about the state of residence halls at KU. Are the halls no longer economical? How does the drop in freshmen enrollment relate to the drop in occupancy?
From 1990 to 1995, the annual cost of housing rose 42.8 percent. That figure is above the national average of 23.9 percent. Ken Stoner director of student housing has said that the increase was needed to keep up with inflationary pressures, but inflation has not risen by 42.8 percent during the same period of time.
Also from 1990 to 1995, freshmen enrollment dropped 13 percent. Such a drop in enrollment would have a dramatic effect on occupancy. However, occupancy in the halls is down
Recently approved housing fee increases indicate that a change in the housing system soon will be necessary.
25 percent during that same period.
This problem goes deeper than crunching numbers. Styles and tastes of college students have changed. One needs only to look at the full occupancy at Naismith Hall, Jayhawker Towers and the scholarship halls — places where students live with more privacy and freedom—to realize this.
The department must change its approach to the housing system to remain a viable competitor for student living.
This will not be easy, especially with apartment and townhouse construction on the rise in Lawrence. The department recently completed a study on the possible renovations of Lewis and Templin Halls. It is a start, but the department must do more before the occupancy rates fall any lower.
TIM MUIR FOR THE EDITORIAL BOARD
Issues, not political rhetoric should be focus of Congress
Watching the opening of the 104th Congress was like watching a threering circus — the show was great, but now it's time to deal with the everyday drudgery of real life.
The Republicans should be congratulated on a performance executed with professional showmanship. The timing was precise; the feelings expressed contained sincere and dramatic qualities that no doubt made Ronald Reagan and Sonny Bono proud. Now it's time to dispense with the drama and concentrate on quality legislative policy making.
Nothing would make our noble leaders happier than to continue throwing us footage of themselves slaving away on Capitol Hill, cutting their staffs or debating why congressional absentee voting is unethical. But why should we be so impressed?
If staffs the size of small armies help our legislators create effective and efficient health-care legislation, so be it. If that means we won't have to fear our health-care bills more than we fear death or that we can revamp the welfare system based on facts and not stereotypes, so be it.
Jeff MacNelly / CHICAGO TRIBUNE
Are we supposed to be impressed that the politicians have finally gotten around to making themselves subject to the laws they create? Sure, it's great they got around to it, but they ought to be embarrassed that they have only
It's our fault. We lack creativity. When we demand change, we don't really know what we want — big government, lean government or mean government. It's all been tried. What we need is effective government, but that can't happen as long as our politicians are preoccupied with convincing their constituents that when they talk about the middle class, they mean you.
Instead, we can only hope that lawmakers will have the strength of character to make decisions based on principle and not the empty ideology behind political rhetoric.
now taken the plunge.
Not only that, but they're heralding the concept as if it were some heroic accomplishment.
Our elected officials must think we are fools, and maybe they are right.
Perhaps they know that when
the O.J. Simpson trial gets into run swing, that when a gory war breaks out in some small corner of the world or that when the issues require us to look beyond buzz words like "middle class" and "old order," we will lose interest. Our fearless leaders will be arm wrestling instead of hand-shaking.
They will answer with claims of being "new" or advocating "real change." They will artfully explain why everything wrong with the world is the other side's fault and then promise to cut our taxes while shrinking the debt.
Two years from now, when the hand-shaking is a faint memory, we will threaten our leaders with their jobs.
Change for our nation's lawmakers seems to be a state of mind, not a matter to take to the depths of our legislative process. Transition between Republicans and Democrats isn't really change. It's only a shifting of responsibility.
It's hard not to be cynical when one watches politicians such as Newt Gingrich declare themselves "new" and then classify any dissenters as part of the "old order." He has been haunting the floor of the House since the 96th Congress.
days people who aren't cynical need to crawl out of the burrows they have been living in and start wising up.
Is this cynicism? Perhaps, but these
Heather Kirkwood is a Wichita junior In Journalism.
Inmate speaks out on new prison pay policy
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
How do inmates feel about this new pay policy?
I wanted to respond to Jason McClure's editorial titled "Making criminals pay for services is a smart idea" in the Dec. 6 Kansan. My concern is not necessarily what the editorial contained but what it failed to mention.
They feel that it's unfair and is not being used to help, other than to save the state money. Fundamentally, I have no problem making a lawbreaker accountable. However, in this case, what may seem to be good on the surface has some serious drawbacks.
STAFF COLUMNIST
For instance, let's say that an innate is earning from $9 (if he/she
But, for the majority, it will have little impact in terms of making them responsible. If an inmate receives money from family, $3 won'tmatter.
My wedding day was extraordinary
Two years ago on a cold, snowy Jan. 16th, I found out just how right the Boss was. On Jan. 16, 1993, I married the girl who wanted to wear myring.
For a very small percentage, it might.
as expected, but nothing prepared me for how wonderful marriage itself has proved to be. Not that marriage is uninterrupted domestic bliss, but there is never a day that makes me regret my "I do."
If an inmate does not, he will sufffer more than necessary.
You can readily see that actual money to buy these items is scarce. The inmate then is charged a service fee but has no sav in the matter.
What if the inmate earns $9 a month? That person is charged $2 for sick call and $1 for processing a personal account. That leaves $6 for the month. As you might guess, $6 cannot begin to meet the needs of an
The question is whether charging inmates for services will make them responsible and accountable.
is unable medically to work) to $29.40 a month. This is top pay a月 month, unless you are afforded the privilege of working a minimum wage job. Many inmates work 40 plus hours a week with no additional pay benefits. Compound this with an inmate relying solely on these earnings to purchase stamps, shampoo, a candy bar, coffee, shower shoes, any personal hygiene item, tennis shoes, a radio, a television or a sweat suit.
individual no matter how you squeeze the money.
Karl and Scott don't now they don't mean a thing/ If you got a girl that loves you/ and who wants to wear your ring."
Keep in mind the inmate is allegedly being taught to be responsible and accountable. Forced to choose between going on sick call or buying food, an inmate will choose food every time.
Even for someone as verbose as I am, I have a difficult time trying to articulate what my wife and our marriage means to me. How do I describe the feeling of complete happiness and contentment that marriage has brought to me? How do I describe the sense of happiness I have when I am with her? I still have the same sense of excitement in my stomach and the same gleam in my eyes that I did when on our first date. And while time may rob us of our youth, it will never rob us of our passion.
STAFF COLUMNIST
Ormond Wimberly Lansing resident
Anniversary a reminder of commitment, wedding vows
While my wife is definitely my best friend, she is still the woman who takes my breath away. She is my sweet thing. She's still the girl who stole my heart.
It wasn't just my beautiful bride who was walking down the aisle that day two years ago. It was my best friend. And that friendship means just as much to me as all the more romantic aspects of love. These two years of marriage have brought me immeasurably closer to my wife. And I know that we are so much better friends than we were two years ago.
January 16th will be a special day for many of us this year. But while most of you are celebrating the birth and life of Martin Luther King Jr., I will be involved in a different celebration. In the song "All That Heaven Will Allow," Bruce Springsteen wrote, "Rain and storm and dark skies/Well
So, Kathie Anne Staab, now Katie Anne Shump, thank you for all of the love, laughter and happiness that you have given me in these past two years. Nothing in my life has brought me more joy than being your husband. Here's to our first two years of marriage and all the years to come.
Romantic relationships may come and go, but that friendship remains. The intimacy that allows you to share your feelings completely is one of the best aspects of a close friendship.
Guest columns: Should be double-spaced typed with fewer than 700 words. The writer must be willing to be photographed for the column to run.
Nicolas Shump is a Lawrence senior in comparative literature.
All letter and guest columns should be submitted to the Kansan newsroom, 1.11 Stauffer-Flint Hall. The Kansan reserves the right to edit, cut to length or out-right reject all submissions. For any questions, call Matt Gowen, editorial page editor, or Heather Lawrenz, associate editorial page editor, at 864-4810.
Letters: Should be double-spaced typed and fewer than 200 words. Letters must include the author's signature, name, address and telephone number plus class and hometown if a University student. Faculty or staff members must identify their positions.
How to submit letters and guest columns
By Greg Hardin