8
Tuesday, April 6. 1976
University Daily Kansan
Students struggle with alienation
By JANET SCHMIDT
With 22,796 students enrolled this semester at the University of Kansas, some students may understand what it means to be lonely in a crowd.
Some, especially during enrollment, may be depersonalized by the University's student body.
Some if their classes are crowded, may think their personal needs have been unfairly ignored to expeditently accommodate the majority's.
Others may feel overwhelmed by compete and excel pedagically.
Some may think that, no matter how hard they try, their levels of performance are far below the desired level.
WHAT THESE students feel is a sense of frustration and separation known as
Still others may feel isolated from the University's social life, or think that the size and mobility of the student population is difficult to develop and maintain friendships.
Alienation, says Dean Kerkman, clinical psychologist with the Student Mental Health Clinic at Watkins Hospital, is a normal part of growing up.
"With it there are generally some technical strangeness of power or laziness at delicately handling them."
Alenation is a negative stage he said, because it begins with a rejection of values in himself.
Significant changes in life, such as graduation from college, often result in a
"DURING THIS stage, certain conflicts arise over commitment," he said. "The person will ask himself: What do I really want and I going—What toward what job or career?"
Although Kerkman defines alienation as internal conflict, some sociologists and psychologists describe it as a conflict between an individual and his social environment.
"Somebody have to find their place and be able to have a sense of self-worth,"
"Mass society factors are as strong or stronger than they've ever been," said Rick Snyder, assistant professor of psychology at North Carolina State University, who have a place of distinction and uniqueness.
Alienation occurs in a society characterized by changing norms and by a mobile society. Snyder said. One reaction to this was to attack the student unrest of the 90%, he said.
Photo prizes to be mailed
Winners will receive $7 for each first place prize for third and $4 for each fourth place prize, each with honorable mention.
Cash prizes for winners of the Ninth Annual University Photography Contest, sponsored last week by SUA and the department of photojournalism of the William Allen White School of Journalism, will be mailed soon.
Grand Prize winners were awarded merchandise prizes from area businesses.
First place winner David Crenshaw,
Overland Park senior, was awarded a strobe flash unit; second place winner Paul Diener, Lawrence sophomore, was awarded a camera bag; third place winner Don Pierce, Lawrence junior, was awarded a camera bag; fourth place winner Mika Campbell, Lawrence junior, was awarded a small strobe unit.
All KU students were eligible to enter the context
Thirty-four students entered about 150 photos in the contest. A $2 entry fee was charged to each student, to be divided among the contest winners as prize money. Judges of the contest were John Filo, Associated Press photographer in Kansas and Dale Monaghan, United Press International photographer in Kansas City, Mo.
"THE UNREST of the '60s was a vehicle for the frustrations of de-individualization—being a number," he said. "Students found a way to vent those frustrations through protests labeled as anger about the Vietnam war."
Some students used the rioting on the KU campus to assert their individuality, and to establish themselves.
"The protests were often just a way of 'getting recognition' sit in the dean's office and be recognized," he said. "And, because it was the day I was against, a sense of camaraderie developed."
There is a noticeable difference between today's student, who seems to internalize his sense of alienation, and the student of his class who expressed it more openly, Snyder said.
"THERE'S NOTHING to fight against now," he said. "Because there's more competition and fewer opportunities on the field, we're more concerned with setting grades."
"I find it more difficult to get in touch with what students are thinking. They're more introspective and quieter than before."
Sakari Sarolia, professor of sociology, said people experienced alienation when they felt their lives were directed by the institutional official institutions and arrangements."
College education is alienating because it imposes standards and expectations upon students that may conflict with their own be said.
The result may be stifling or threatening, Sariola said.
SOME STUDENTS cope with alienation by becoming too cooperative, or "brown-nosing." Sariola said, while others become apathetic.
"If a student chooses this passive-dependent role, he may become doubly alienated," he said. "He does not show the interest of undertaking research projects, term papers and these types of seeking, nor does he succeed in asserting himself to the extent of undertaking research projects, term papers and these types of seeking."
"His academic work is then reduced into
"instruments, routine acts," not much
interesting.
Mike Lacy, assistant instructor of sociology, said student alienation occurred especially when the student's goals were different from the University's.
"BECAUSE OF the job crunch, many students expect the University to provide them some sort of training," he said. "But university is more concerned with education."
Sariola said that undergraduates were probably less satisfied with the education they received at KU than graduate students.
Large lecture classes and an inability to develop a rapport with faculty members contribute to student dissatisfaction, he said. As graduate students, classroom situations and relationships between students and faculty are more personal, he said.
"Most graduate students have an interesting piece of research—a chance to express themselves and do what they want to do." Sarola said.
HOWEVER, ONE undergraduate, Scott Jones, Lawrence sophomore, disagreed that large lecture classes detracted from his education.
"Most of the classes I've had require lab sessions," he said.
Jones said he received individual attention in the labs because the number of samples he tested was large.
Dun Doria, Lawrence graduate student in architecture, said classes became more complex.
Corda said that many of the graduate students were professional architects and that he was sometimes overwhelmed by pressure to compete.
"OUR DEPARTMENT is very small--maybe 15 graduate students at the most," be said. "But most of them are part-time students and commuters."
Robert Miller, chairman of the department of sociology at Baker University, said he thought students at Baker felt less overwhelmed by U-Baker has an enrollment of 799 students.
"You gear by what everyone else is doing," he said. "in one of my classes, there are many people who don't."
already working as architects. Keeping up with them is difficult."
"The greater the number of groups the individual comes in contact with, the more groups it is expected to conform to the values of those groups," he said. "This has been proved in studies comparing the effects of the urban environment to those of the small country."
The number of students at KU is a major cause of alienation.
MILLER SAID alioning depended upon the size and number of groups exerting their influence.
Some KU students may feel especially alienated if they are from a small town and the congenial atmosphere of a high school, where everyone knows everyone else.
Students don't try to meet others because they are reluctant to leave the security of the room.
Jim Thompson, McPherson junior, said some students relied on high school friend-help.
THEN, IF they become dissatisfied, they usually don't know how to cope with it and feel even more alienated from the University, he said.
Thompson, who came from a high school that had 700 students, said he didn't felt intimidated by the large-university atmosphere because KU was divided into small units of students. Thompson lived in a men's scholarship hall his first year at
"It helped live at Grace Pearson Hall my freshman year," he said. "There were only 50 people living there so we got to know each other really well."
Dennis Hale, Towanda junior, said most of his friends were people he had known. He said that many were kids.
"I haven't really tried to meet other people," he said. "But I don't feel alienated."
SOME STUDENTS may become
labeled they have come to Lawrence
Rick Purvis, Compton, Calif., sophomore.
Kathy Kopacz, Chicago junior, lives at Filsworth Hall. She said residence halls sometimes restricted students from getting involved in other University activities.
“IT'S VERY easy to limit yourself to just doing things in the dorms and with people living on your floor,” she said. “It becomes a habit.”
said that Lawrence was much larger than he had expected but added that he missed some of the convenience of living in a metropolitan area.
Some students say it's not the size of the University, but where they live while attending it that determines whether they feel isolated.
Kopacz said that she enjoyed living at Elishaw because she had met so many friends.
"I'll call my room a home, but I don't feel like it is a home," he said. "It isn't warm, but it's hot."
"It's not as close to everything as I would like," he said. "Even Kansas City is an hour away. I miss being closer to cultural activities."
Some people Kopac said, are unhappy at Pihrworth because so many students live
"The girl next door moved out because there were just too many people," she said. "Some people only got to know the people on their floor because that's all they can take."
All students ora invited to enter. Entries taken through April 30. For more information and entry forms, stop by the SUA Office.
FACES
DISCO
1. Marty Rock's Disco Tex and the Sexo-
lMas
Your chance to dance to
SUA
&
The Office of
Student Affairs
Announces
The Second Annual
Student Sculpture
Competition
2. Ecstacy, Passion and Pain
3. The First Choice
2. Ecstacy, Passion and Pain
The biggest Disco happening to ever take place in the Midwest.
7:00-12:00 p.m. at Kemper Arena
PLUS, a *1,000 Dance Contest Friday, April 9th
Faces for Revue '76 Is Open to the Public.
Midwest.
Tickets $5.50 in advance & $4.50 day of the concert at
Caper's Corners, Tigers Records and Kief's.
Contestants, Only the First 500 Couples to Sign Up at
Kemper Arena, 4:00:7:00 p.m., will be allowed to enter
the Dance Contest.
MOONLIGHT MADNESS
Tuesday 7-9:30 p.m.
FRYE BOOTS
All Styles $5-$10 off
HAND BAGS Selected Styles 20%-50% off
MOCCASINS Selected Styles 50% off
ALL SALES FINAL
PRIMARILY
LEATHER
craftsmen of fine leather goods
812 Massachusetts
INTRAMURAL WRESTLING CLINIC
8:00 p.m. Tues., April 6
South Gymnasium—Robinson
—Wrestling competition to follow at later date
Clinic mandatory for competition
APRIL FEATURE ATTRACTIONS
MISS STREET DELI
ITALIAN BEEF GRINDER
Choice beef, sliced thin man-
rated in a special sauce to give
this beef a true Italian flavor,
served on a French dip hard roll.
$1.50
Reg. $1.90
GP
Present Coupon Expires April 30
NEW YORKER
1021
MASSACHUSETTS ST.
$1.00 OFF—with this Coupon
G ANY LARGE PIZZA
"The original thick crust pizza from New York."
Expires April 30
Open Face Hot Beef Sandwich G $1.50 Rea. $1.95
Served with thin sliced roast beef, home-made potatoes — smothered in dark brown gravy. Relishes
Present Coupon Expires April 30
NEW YORKER 1021 MASSACHUSETTS ST.
Coors Pitchers 95° 60 oz.
WITH
THIS COUPON
Limit 1 Pitcher per couple per day. res April 30, 1976
"Truly the Most Wonderful
Happening in Lawrence."
Gone Chalet
Showtime
11 a.m. till Closing Nightly
April 1 to April 30
Place a Kansan want ad. Call 864-4358