UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Friday, February 11. 1994
5
Partnership will increase bureaucracy, benefit few
I'm a second-semester freshman. I totally disagree with the tuition increase and the Partnership for Excellence plan. One of the reasons I came to KU was because its tuition is quite a bit lower than some of the other state schools, but also because it's an excellent school.
If we do have to have a tuition increase, let's use it for something useful, like more parking spots, or maybe hiring a new administration. I'm fed up with this administration. That's one thing we could use it on.
I don't think that the faculty deserve a pay raise. I don't see any of my professors in class; it's always GTAs that are doing the teaching. They (professors) don't do any work. So, why should they get a pay raise?
I see spending cuts that we could make. There are some stupid, stupid organizations. Parts of this administration are just totally pointless, and
On Monday the Kansan asked for students' opinions about the Partnership for Excellence.
Following are the responses we received.
we're repaying these people to do these jobs. Let's cut some of those positions and the bureaucracy here at the University of Kansas.
Raising tuition not in the best interest of students
because I think a tuition raise would not be in the interest of students. Most people that I know — residents and non-residents — have a hard nought time trying to pay what they're being charged right now.
I think that the faculty salaries need to be raised, but I think the money needs to come from somewhere else
My opinion about the Partnership for Excellence is that it's wrong. Yes, they're probably going to raise tuition because they've raised it for the last five years, but there are other things that some of that money could go for, such as raising non-faculty members' (salaries). They have increased the ratio of TA's so high; they've increased the ratio of the bureaucratic system to where the number of faculty members is not going up, but they keep adding administrative duties.
If that is an area that needs to be cut back, I for one would be very unhappy to see tuition raised again.
Money for Partnership could be put to better use
LETTER
Drug problem can be solved by drug camps
Our government doesn't really want to stop the illegal drug trade. The drug trade is now so large and intertwined in our economy that its removal would send the nation into terminal shock.
I propose a special drug camp where additionally disadvantaged persons can get "three hots" a day and unlimited self medication. They won't need much more, not even bars or guards. Cheap, effective and certain.
As a side benefit, the drug trade would be ruined, profits would dry up and traffickers would stop their gradual takeover of legitimate business.
Because this program would virtually eliminate crime, gunshot wounds, robberies, car-jacking and related social problems, it would surely be popular.
Topekaresident
Needs of graduate students are good reason for graduate senate
A separate representative body for graduate students was established Jan. 19 by Student Senate. The measure's supporters mustered the necessary two-thirds majority by a comfortable margin, but it also produced a lot of grumbling by some senators and a negative, insulting editorial in the Kansan.
The editorial voiced sentiments that probably are shared by many undergraduates. Why do we need a graduate student government? Why does a group of students constituting only 30 percent of the total campus population deserve a separate voice? The editorial clided graduate students for failing to participate in the original Student Senate and suggested that we reflect upon our guilty and apathetic souls before creating our own government.
The basic argument here is that graduate students are just older and busier versions of undergraduates. This is not so. Graduate students have distinct problems and needs that are best addressed by a separate governing body. Above all, this new graduate senate must focus on building a sense
of community in a very fragmented graduate student population.
Undergraduates at the University have a variety of shared institutions and experiences that help create a sense of commonality. Many live in student housing and share the same physical spaces day after day. Core curriculum requirements throw together students with different backgrounds. A survey course in psychology, for example, is likely to include in one classroom students from all majors and walks of life. This is not to deny the heterogeneity that characterizes KU students. But opportunities do exist for undergraduate
uates to bridge their differences and build a community. That is what university life is supposed to be all about.
Graduate students, in contrast, are a motley bunch with few opportunities for getting to know each other or undergraduates. Amultitude of interests compete with the University for our attention. Many graduates are married. Mosthave worked for several years before coming back to school and are older than the average undergraduate. Nearly all graduate students live off-campus.
Graduate students do not even have shared academic interests. We have no core curriculum requirements, and therefore we do not share a classroom with students from other majors. In fact, many of us spend our entire careers at the University in only one or two buildings. Opportunities for interaction with the campus community as a whole—such as writing a column for the student newspaper—are precious because they are so rare.
Graduate students are pulled in several different directions at once. We did not ignore the Senate because of apathy. Heaven knows, we aren't lazy
(those of us who are will not be around very long). The Senate was just one more competing interest among many, and it represented a campus community that has little impact on our daily lives and with which we have infrequent contact.
I hope that this will change with the new arrangement. I believe that graduate students will be far more enthusiastic about participating in a separate governing body because it will be tuned to our specific problems and needs in a way the old Senate never could be.
The purpose of a separate Graduate Senate is not to further isolate graduate students, but rather to focus our concerns in one governing body and communicate them to the University. The new Graduate Senate is not an unreasonable demand for disproportionate power as the Kansan editorial insinuated. It is an anchor that graduate students can use to attach themselves to the larger KU community.
Brian Dirk is a Conway, Ark., graduate in history.
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