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Tomorrow's weather
KS STATE HISTORICAL SOCIETY
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KU
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY
Tomorrow should be beautiful! Warming up with sunny skies all day.
ansan
HIGH LOW 71 43
Tuesday
April 21, 1998
Section:
A
Vol. 108 • No. 141
Online today
Still don't have a job set up for after graduation? Try searching one of the many online job banks.
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Sports today
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Kansas centerfielder Clint Wyrick hopes to end the season with a bang by helping the Jayhawks earn a trip to the Big 12 tournament.
SEE PAGE 1B
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Today's college graduates face more of a challenge finding full-time work than previous generations. The job market seems to be saturated with
INSTABILITY
(USPS 650-640)
Story by Melissa Ngo· Illustration by Jeff Shumway
ten months after graduating with a mechanical engineering degree from the University of Kansas, life is not going the way Patrick Elrod had imagined.
He is a liaison engineer for Boeing in Wichita in its Struts and Nacelle Responsibility Center. This is his second position at Boeing. Five months after Elrod started working at the Space and Defense division, his project was terminated. Not everyone was transferred to a different project. Some people were simply out of a job.
"One day everything was fine. The next day there were rumors that the project was running out of money, and three days later boxes were coming in to move your stuff out," Elrod said. "It is a crazy feeling."
It is a fact of life for KU seniors: 1998 graduates face a bleaker job market than their parents did. Job instability, contract jobs, part-time jobs and less benefits all add up to a future where diplomas are not the gateway to life in the suburbs that they once were.
Job instability, a threat not even on the radar screens of new graduates 30 years ago, is common in all areas of business now, said Darryll Fortune, strategic communications manager for Sprint, headquartered in Kansas City.
Employees consistently rank their perception of job security low in Sprint attitude surveys, Fortune said, and added, "In some industries it's difficult to keep people satisfied because employees wonder if they're going to have a job from day to day."
Job instability is only one of the many differences between the job market new graduates face and the one their parents faced 20 or 30 years ago.
True, there is a greater demand for specialized degrees such as computer technology and engineering in today's market.
But, although companies want people with specialized degrees, companies also want employees with the ability to work outside their specialization.
"Employees also need excellent communications skills." Fortune said.
Employers also want to cut costs and one way to do that is to hire contract workers. Fortune said companies could save money on health benefits, social security benefits, office space and many other things with contract workers instead of full-time employees. Sprint has increasingly hired contract workers during the last decade
It is all part of a growing trend throughout the business world.
Bill Staples, professor of sociology, teaches SOC 525: Sociology of Work. He said contract, temporary and part-time jobs make up many of the jobs created in the last five to eight years.
"When AT&T is laying off 40,000 people, you can see that all of corporate America is restructuring and cutting back on the work force," Staples said. "This means there are fewer career opportunities."
A 1994 study by the U.S. Department of Education found that 87 percent of students one or two years out of college were employed. Fourteen percent of those employed had part-time jobs.
Surveys in the 1970s did not discuss how many people had part-time jobs.
"Part-time employment was not nearly as prevalent in the 1970s," said Aurora D'Amico, U.S. Department of Education statistician. "It seems to be a phenomenon which emerged more recently."
This phenomenon affects many recent graduates.
"I see students I've taught who have graduated and they're working at the mall," Staples said.
See GRADUATES on page 5A
Peter Benson graduated in December 1996 with a degree in journalism, with an emphasis in advertising. He continues work as a pizza delivery man while searching for an
Two lose Senate seats for campaign violations
By Melissa Ngo
mngo@kansan.com
Kansas staff writer
The campaign violations hearings board disqualified two newly elected Student Senators from holding their seats for not attending mandatory candidate workshops.
LaShawwal Harris, newly elected Delta Force nontraditional senator, was disqualified. However, she said the disqualification did not matter because she had resigned from the coalition before the elections but her name still was not taken off the ballot.
Sasha Ringler, Campus Cause candidate for a Nunemaker seat, also did not attend the candidate workshops. Because she did not win the election, she could not be disqualified from office and instead was fined $50, said Brad Finkeldel, Elections Commission chairman and hearings board member.
Ryan Price, newly elected Campus Cause Nunemaker senator, also was disqualified, but he could not be reached for comment.
Maria Abatijouglu, the only Delta Force candidate for a Liberal Arts and Sciences seat not to be elected, did not have her name on the ballot for six hours of the first day of elections. Before being printed, the ballot was reviewed by both Delta Force and the Elections Commission.
The board also decided not to order a new election for College of Liberal Arts and Sciences candidates.
Before the decision, Abatlogou had said that she did not want to penalize this year's CLAS winners by requesting a new election.
"I ask that I receive an eleventh senatorial seat in the CLAS," she said. "If this is not possible, I
seek an appointed position on Student Senate."
Finkeldei said the board decided that it did not have the authority to appoint Abatijoglu to a Senate position or to create another CLAS seat.
"We have decided to recommend to Student Senate that they strongly consider Maria when they next have a seat open," Finkeldel said.
"I just hope that Scott Kaiser and Kevin Yoder take the recommendation seriously and consider me for something," she said. "I think it is unfortunate that I am missing out on this opportunity because of human error."
After hearing the ruling, Abatoglou said she hoped she could serve on Senate.
The hearings board also decided last night to fine Campus Cause $50 for placing campaign materials on doors at an apartment complex without the apartment manager's permission.
Yoder and Kaiser are the newly elected student body president and vice president.
Yoder said the coalition was guilty because of miscommunication about which complexes had allowed the coalition to distribute campaign material.
Campus Cause also was fined $30 for displaying eight posters visible from the Ekdahl Dining Commons rolling site.
Audrey Nogle, elections commissioner, had filed the complaint after asking both coalitions to take down posters placed in Lewis Hall. She gave the coalitions a one-hour deadline that Delta Force met but that Campus Cause did not meet.
More Student Senate coverage Coalitions loyalty again may divide Senate. See page 6A
Officials may revoke bars' licenses
Action on hold until investigation complete
By Ronnie Wachter
rwachter@kansan.com
Kansan staff writer
Some University of Kansas students say they are concerned that neither of the bars involved in the accident that fatally injured Lisa Rosel are being investigated by authorities.
Stephanie Smith, Wichita junior, said she was concerned about the amount of drunk driving in Lawrence.
"People are still doing it, even after this girl got killed," she said. "It's not just the bars. They could get their alcohol from stores or other places."
Rosel, Overland Park freshman, was fatally injured March 31 when she was struck by a 1997 Mitsuishi Montero that was driven by a legally intoxicated KU student.
The driver, Matthew Vestal, Englewood, Colo., freshman, had been drinking at The Crossing, 618 12th St., and Rosel had been drinking at Bull-Winkles, 1344 Tennessee St., Lawrence police said. Both students were underage.
"Obviously, there's a problem," said Mark Auerbach, Warren, N.J., senior. "The bars and the police should at least pretend to be enforcing the laws."
Mike Wildgen, city manager, said the city commission was investigating the roles The Crossing and BullWinkles played in the incident. He said the cereal malt beverage licenses that were issued by the city to the two bars could be suspended or revoked by the
Source: U.S. Dept. of Transportation, 1996 Andrew Rohribach KANSAN
Scott Teeselink, KBI media agent, said he did not know when the results of the blood tests be conducted on Vestal and Rosel would be released.
city commission.
However, Wildgen said the commission did not know what, if any, action it would take.
"The city attorney is reviewing this, I assure you," Wilden said. "The city can't take any action until the city attorney completes his investigation."
City Attorney Gerald Cooley's office is closed this week, and he could not be reached for comment.
"I can tell you that as soon as the investigation is over." she said. "we'll
Douglas County District Attorney Christine Tonkovich said she expected that each bar would be examined for its role in the accident.
Although neither the police nor the city commission can take any action yet, Lawrence Mayor Marty Kennedy said he had begun taking steps to lower the level of drunk driving.
look at the whole picture."
"At this time, we have already begun putting together a commission to see what can be done about these problems," he said. "We've extended invitations to the chancellor and the president of Haskell to be involved in this."
Kennedy said educating Lawrence residents about the dangers of drunk driving and the penalties of underage drinking would be the commission's focus.
Auerbach said both problems needed to be addressed.
"Everybody drives to the Bull, and they park on Tennessee Street," he said. "So you have drunk people crossing the street to get to their cars, with drunk drivers on the road leaving. Whether you're drunk or sober, it's not very safe."
Kelly Huffman, Student Senate Executive Committee chairman and member of the Student Senate Transportation Board, said the board was considering a bill that could help reduce drunk driving in Lawrence.
The bill, which Huffman said was created the week before Spring Break, would create a new bus route that would drive along Massachusetts Street at night, then drop passengers off close to their homes. The bill will be considered at 2:30 today during the transportation board's meeting.