Opinion
Kansan
Published daily since 1912
Julie Wood, Editor Laura Roddy, Managing editor Cory Graham, Managing editor Tom Eblen, General manager, news adviser
Brandi Byram, Business manager
Shauntea Blue, Retail sales manager
Dan Simon, Sales and marketing adviser
Scott Vallier, Technology coordinator
Thursday, December 2, 1999
Seth Jones / KANSAN
Editorials
Senators shouldn't show reserve while spending leftover funding
Each semester Student Senate takes $17 from each student's campus fee and allocates the money to student organizations or activities. If an organization does not spend the money it has been budgeted, the remainder goes into a reserve account. As time has passed, Student Senate now finds itself with $380,000 in this account to spend as the senators choose. What a wonderful opportunity Student Senate has to make a widespread and visible difference on campus. Now is the time to focus the reserve budget on a practical and functional idea.
Two possibilities for such a project include the renovation and improvement of the KU Info bus stop on Jayhawk Boulevard and the construction of student information kiosks on campus. Logically, the money from the reserve account should be spent on something that directly benefits students. They have paid the activity fee each semester, and if we can't hand out cash refunds, then students need something that is more useful than a statue or plaque.
Total reserve of $380,000 should be spent on projects that benefit students
The bus stop is a bit of an eye sore and definitely could be more aesthetically pleasing with a small overhaul and some new benches. An even more practical idea would be to support the
student organizations on campus by setting up outdoor kiosks in centralized areas specifically for posting information about events and activities. Ever since the University placed tighter restrictions on posting fliers it has been difficult for many student groups to advertise.
Each senator should consider the advantages in spending the entire reserve account on a one-time, nonmaintenance project, instead of holding money back. The current reserve account has been accumulated during a short period of time. Whatever steps Senate takes in the next few months with the reserve account, we hope that the money will be spent in an innovative and worthwhile manner.
Corey Snyder for the editorial board
Leave halls open during holiday break
Thanksgiving break is a time when students are expected to go home and spend a nice, long weekend with their families. This is obviously what the Department of Student Housing officials believe. Residence hall students — with the exception of those living in McCollum Hall — are forced to leave their rooms on Tuesday night of the break and not return until Sunday. The dining hall does not start serving food again until Monday morning when school resumes.
Many schools leave their residence halls open during Thanksgiving break for several reasons. First, because the holiday lasts only five days, many students cannot return home. If they are not McCollum residents, these students have either to find friends to
Students who can't go home or need to study should be able to stay in halls
stay with or rent a room in McCollum.
These students are charged $10 a day to live in rooms that do not have phone lines or a cable hookup.
A second reason that the residence halls should not close is because of the amount of school work that many students have during Thanksgiving break. Students may have to write papers or study for tests, and their parents' homes are not conducive to studying, especially if relatives are visiting for the holiday.
allow the staff extra days off, but there actually is extra work for the staff. Every room must be checked to ensure that the blinds are down and open, the trash is taken out and electrical items unplugged. Apparently, something bad will occur if students close their blinds and leave their appliances unsupervised for five days.
It is an inconvenience for many students to be unable to enter their homes for five days. Leaving a needed textbook in the room could lead to a minor disaster.
Closing the residence halls does
The residence halls should be open during Thanksgiving break. There is no good reason to close them, and the advantages of allowing students to stay in their rooms during break far outweigh the disadvantages.
Kansan staff
Emily Haverkamp for the editorial board
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Broaden your mind: Today's quote
"When I hear somebody sigh, 'Life is hard,' I am always tempted to ask, 'Compared to what?' — Sydney Harris
How to submit letters and guest columns
**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 must identify their positions.
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All letters and guest columns should be submitted to the Kansan newsroom, 111 Stuffer-Flint Hall. The Kansan reserves the right to edit, cut to length or reject all submissions. For any questions, call Chad Betters or Seth Hattam at 864-4924.
If you have general questions or comments, e-mail the page staff (opinion@kansan.com) or call 864-4924
"Study nature, not books." — Louis Agassiz, founder of the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Harvard University.
Perspective
Nature a better teacher than any book or class
cent purple back snirling in the light. Despite its delicate body, this little bird didn't appear afraid. As Gloriana cupped the bird in her hands, we peered closer, looking at the tiny feathers, strong wings and long beak.
The crowned Woodnymph hummingbird ewd us calmly as our teacher Gloriaan extracted it from the net, its bright green neck and irides- tory beak.
Matt
Merkel-Hess
columnist
opinion@ kansan.com
Experiences like this make a 5:30 a.m. wake-up call worth it.
After a few minutes we let the hummer go and took down the badminton-like net. This was only one of
the 25 or so bird watching trips we'd taken this semester. Usually, bird-watching involves getting up early, going to a likely spot — just about anywhere here in Costa Rica — and moving quietly or standing still with all your senses trained on your surroundings. Once a bird is spotted, binoculars can give you a closer view, but I prefer to use my eyes. It usually doesn't take long to see something amazing.
Most of us in the class have seen more than 100 species of birds, from the mundane to jaw-dropping exotics. Brightly colored toucans cruise around, their yellow and black beaks looking like plastic Halloween costumes. Parakeets flit happily about in pairs or groups, always bubbling with song. Close to rivers, kingfishers patrol for food, and small birds such as the euphonias and many tanagers have colors so bright you'll wonder how they hide from predators.
I met Mike this fall when he returned to Costa Rica to study frogs, other amphibians and reptiles. His interest in herpetology began at a young age in Kansas City and continued throughout college. In the summer of 1998 he participated in the Estudios Tropicales program through the University and had lived with the same family I do now. In addition to having another Jayhawk to talk to, it was fascinating to glean information from him.
Poison dart frogs (sometimes misnamed poison arrow frogs) get away with being so colorful because of the toxins in their skin. Indigenous tribes used the toxins to coat the tips of their darts to make deadly hunting tools. The frogs aren't all that uncommon in the jungle. Keep your eyes open, and you have a good chance of finding some. In Bastimentos, different populations of the frog, Dendrobates pumilio, evolved different color patterns on their skin known as colormorphs. Now, many of these populations have mixed to create the display Mike and I saw.
It's impossible even to begin to describe all these birds, but seeing, hearing or even just looking for birds is better than the caged tropical birds you see in the United States. But birds are not the only exotic creatures I've seen.
"I've never seen this many frogs at once," said Mike Jorgensen, a December 1998 KU graduate in biology. It was 30 minutes after a rainfall on the island of Bastimentos in the archipelago of Bocas del Toro, Panama, and the poison dart frogs were scampering about like grasshoppers. Everywhere we looked there were little frogs about the size of your last thumb joint sporting red, orange, yellow, white, blue or green, with or without black spots. It was the most colorful display of life I'd ever seen. This is why Mike came to the tropics.
"Hey, over here," Mike said as he leaned in with his camera. "You got to see this one!"
There's a lot of things "you got to see" in the tropics. I didn't ever think I'd gladly spend a whole day hunched over in the jungle looking for frogs. But this was worth it.
Definitely better than any book could be.
Merkel-Hess is an Iowa City, Iowa junior in environmental studies. He is studying abroad in Golfito, Costa Rica.
Feedback
Review not enough
There is something wrong with how the Kansan does its movie reviews, especially the review in Friday's paper "World is Not Enough to save Bond Bomb." First of all, I would like to define what a good movie critic should do in his or her movie reviews. A good movie critic should look at a movie and decide whether it is a good movie based on what it is trying to accomplish. In this case, is the new James Bond movie good in comparison to the past 007 movies? It shouldn't be the opinion of one writer who obviously doesn't know very much about what a Bond movie should be. The only thing this review tells moviegoers is that there are lots of women and lots of action. This is something that anyone could tell me. The review also states that the movie gives a bad view on women. What else you expect if you expect if this movie is just "pure fantasy?" People expect to see traditionally beautiful young women when they go to a Bond movie. Again, if you knew anything about Bond movies, you would have known this. The criticism says that "No Bond film [they've] ever seen to date manag]d" to slip in any new or interesting ideas and characters." If this statement is true, why was this critic picked to do a review on a movie where her opinion was predetermined? Basically, all the critic did in this review was criticize Bond movies in general, not this particular film Millions of people have enjoyed this movie series over the many years it has existed. To tell people what they already know, and say it is bad was completely wrong. Next time find a more educated and professional movie critic.
Michal Lisowyj
Omaha freshman
Professor's handbook claims are untrue
The Feedback section of the Nov. 22 Kansan included a letter from Raymond Pierotti, associate professor of ecology and evolutionary biology, in which he made a number of statements about Cancellor Robert Hemenway and other members of the University administration. Professor Pierotti wrote, among other things, "Cancellor Hemenway has... rewritten the faculty handbook, making it much easier to fire tenured faculty." I am
I can state directly and unequivocally that Chancellor Hemenway has not rewritten a single sentence of the Handbook during his tenure at the University of Kansas. When any section of the Handbook is being revised, the draft revisions are circulated for review, comment and correction to more than a dozen University offices and representatives, including a faculty liaison appointed by faculty governance, the president of the Unclassified Professional Staff, and the president of the University of Kansas chapter of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP), among others. No revision of any section is published until this meticulous and lengthy review has been completed.
the university staff member who has been assigned responsibility as editor for the Handbook for Faculty and Other Unclassified Staff, and I must report that this statement is patently untrue.
Procedures governing promotion and tenure are a part of the Faculty Senate Rules and Regulations (Article VI) and in accord with the AAUP's 1968 "Recommended Institution Regulations on Academic Freedom and Tenure." Any change in these procedures must be recommended by elected faculty representatives who serve on the Faculty Council. Only upon the recommendation of the Faculty Council does the chancellor approve any changes.
I am surprised and disappointed to learn that a tenured member of the University faculty is so ill informed about University policies and procedures and about how they are developed and modified.
Jeannette A. Johnson Assistant to the provost
Army is the loser
A perennial election year commendum is how to deal with defense spending. Well, the problem just got a little bit easier now that there is one fewer branch of our vaunted military. Well, not yet, but the Wall Street Journal reported on Tuesday that the U.S. Army will no longer air recruitment ads during the World Wrestling Federation's elegant display of fistcuffmanship, WWF Smackdown! This bold move shall eventually remove the Army from America's brittle "what you have done for me
Why would the Army shoot itself in the foot, you ask?
lately" brainlengths and force the demise of the once-proud brigade. Sargent Slaughter must be rolling over in his grave.
Simple. Officials said they did not want to be associated with violence or overtly sexual behavior. Now who can blame the Army for this? If the WWF got me into the U.S. Army, those Bob Hope Christmas Special's shot from strategic points of US military invasion certainly would keep my attention. I mean, when you go to war you get to be entertained by the leading stars of film and television! The most violent part of war seemed to be when Bob would introduce the college football All-Americans. Of course this usually scared the timid, sensitive, and well-shaven troops, because you just never know when one of those drunken football players might attack you for not giving him a chalupa. And sorry ladies, but there just isn't anything sexy about Bob Hope. (Although I was always impressed how the show always managed to field a chorus line of beautiful, American women in obscure Middle Eastern locations.)
Where is the Army going to find tomorow's war hero's today now? Dharma and Greg? I don't think so Sparky! Now Army recruiters are reduced to handing out free socks at local high schools and church potluck dinners. Why do you need socks to play on the beach and sip margaritas while being entertained by old bald men?
Our generation has not experienced a war on home soil, and you may list any number of reasons for it, but here are my two cents buckaroo: War is Raw. This is not just the name of a highly popular TV show, it's a national defense strategy, my friend. I, for one, don't know how I'll sleep at night, knowing that the Army is no longer recruiting WWF fans, long proven as safeguards of our fair republic. So I urge you to contact your local Army Recruitment Office (22nd & Louisiana, 843-0465) and demand advertising on WWW so more overweight, undereducated White people will join the Army and save us all from the bad guy, or hang out with Bob Hope, or whatever it is that they do in the U.S. Army.
Jimmy Barmann
Lenexa sophomore
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