OPINION
The University Daily
KANSAN
February 8,1984 Page 4
The University Daily KANSAN
Page 4
Published since 1889 by students of the University of Kansas
The University Daily Kansas (USPS 60-640) is published at the University of Kansas, 118 Stuffer-Flint Hall, Lawrence, KS. Don 6/24 daily for regular school and Monday and Thursday during the summer semester. Students attending six or more classes may pay $10 to the university by mail are $15 for six months or $2 a year in Douglas County and $18 for six months or $35 for a year outside the county. Student subscriptions are $1 a semester pass through the student activity page. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to us@uksp.org.
DOUG CUNNINGHAM
DON KNOX
Managing Editor
SARA KEMPIN
Editorial Editor
JEFF TAYLOR ANDREW HARTLEY Campus Editor News Editor
DAVE WANAMAKER Business Manager
PAUL JESS
CORT GORMAN
Retail Sales Manager
National Sales Manager
General Manager and News Adviser
JANICE PHILIPS   DUNCANCALHUNO
Campus Sales Manager    Classified Manager
JOHN OBERZAN Sales and Marketing Adviser
The problems with the Kansas Integrated Personnel Payroll System are a result of governmental bureaucracy at its worst.
In the four months of its existence, many University of Kansas employees have been stiffed by the state's sloppy planning, coordination and execution of KIPPS.
Luckily, though, almost everybody at KU got paid last week. The state had few foul-ups with the problem-plagued KIPPS.
But the problems are not over. A report issued this week by Mike Harder, Kansas secretary of administration, said it was "difficult to identify the precise benefits of computerization."
The report said that options to upgrade, decentralize or even abandon KIPPS should be carefully weighed to "... prevent wasteful and unproductive decisions."
Because the bugs in the system still need to be worked out, next month's paychecks could still be subject to error. And several million dollars — perhaps as much as $20 million — will probably be spent
fixing KIPPS.
KIPPS was supposed to modernize the state's payroll, eliminating costly waste by combining the myriad of state agency payrolls into one.
The state, a lumbering, clumsy oaf trying to perform a delicate operation, squashed any hopes of having a smoothly running state-wide computerized payroll system.
KU was the only Regents institution dragged into KIPPS, and it suffered the brunt of mistakes when selected state agencies began using KIPPS in November.
The system was poorly designed and never thoroughly tested. Inter-agency communication was poor.
Some problems stemmed from trying to match the system with KU's large and complex payroll structure of classified and unclassified employees.
It is a shame that before smaller Regents institutions or other state agencies with simpler payrolls were placed on KIPPS, KU was used as a guinea pig.
Milestone for women
Now is the time for all good men — and women — to come to the aid of their country.
Barbara Marx Hubbard not only thinks that now is the time for change, but that she is the woman to effect it.
Well, she may not be everyone's answer to the question of which good woman should come to the aid of the nation.
The futurist's plans to run for the vice-presidency have met with mixed reactions. Her "Campaign for a Positive Future" is not something that even every woman supports.
But those who don't agree with everything she stands for should still mark her entry into the vice-presidential race as a milestone.
After hundreds of years of coming to the aid of their families and country in other ways, women are
finally emerging as a political entity.
And certainlv now is the time.
Hubbard's campaign shows just how far women have come in politics. Since i920, when women finally won the vote, until now, when a woman is actively seeking those votes for the second highest position in the country, the struggles have been long and difficult.
Supporting Barbara Hubbard, based on her political positions, may not be something voters will have a chance to do. Because presidential candidates choose their running mates, Hubbard may not have the chance to run as part of a presidential ticket.
But her campaign will still stand as record of the progress women have made in the world of politics. The long and difficult struggles finally have begun to pay off.
Foreign policy is weak
If President Reagan is particularly vulnerable, it is in the area of foreign affairs, especially so in the wake of the October terrorist bombing of the Marine headquarters in Beirut that claimed 241 servicemen's lives.
Nevertheless, his administration's domestic economic record overshadows, for the moment, any possible lackluster performance in foreign affairs.
That event has generated considerable advocacy to bring the Marines home. Also, his successes in Central America have been less than resounding.
Only another sudden disaster, comparable to the Beirut bombing,
Domestically, however, Reagan is vulnerable in the civil rights and social service fields.
Also, his 1980 pledge to balance the budget by 1984 has not been fulfilled. Instead, his successful efforts to cut taxes and boost defense spending has increased the federal deficit to nearly $200 billion, providing grist for his opponents' mills.
So are his attempts to reverse course in civil rights and the entire area of government regulation, from the environment to consumer products, energy controls and occupational safety.
will distract voter attention from Reagan's economic successes.
The (Salt Lake City, Utah) Tribune
The University Daily Kansan welcomes letters to the editor. Letters should be typewritten, double-spaced and should not exceed 300 words. They should include the writer's name, address and phone number. If the writer is affiliated with the University, the letter should include his class and home town or faculty or staff address. The Kansan also invites individuals and groups to submit guest columns. Columns and letters can be mailed or brought to the Kansan office, 111 Staffier-Flint Hall. The Kansan reserves the right to edit or reject letters and columns.
LETTERS POLICY
The writing on the wall
I was scrubbing the baked coffee from the pot, getting ready to fill it for another round of steamy java. Then from my stance at the wash basin, I heard a plea.
"Say, budy, do you have a pen?" I turned and saw no one. "We went away and I went on with my business, scrubbing, filling."
Again the voice called. "Hey, you,
let me use your pen."
I turned abruptly. "Who's there?
Where are you?"
I then saw a hand protruding from the stall. "Let me see a pen. I must answer this guy." the voice retorted.
When the scrawling stopped, the pen swelled forth from the stall, and when I was retrieving my favorite book, I heard the impatient crush of water.
I understood, unsheathed my pen, and fed it to the greedy hand, which put it immediately to use.
An old man emerged from the stall, grinning with a mixture of pride and embarrassment. A cigar protruded from his face, and his red, devilish eyes glared with fury at the stall.
The lover of defacement buckled his pants, and said, "That'll teach those lazy morons to libel a good conservative."
I said, "I hope you're satisfied. I usually don't contribute to the
bathroom wall genre, and I really can't condone it."
The man stopped to comb the hairy, white tuffs spraying from his chin, muttering something about pride and an intellectual revolt.
"The idots have reigned too long in the bathroom. Mispellings, obnoxious comments and disheartened
I found the conversation odd and trivial, not to mention one-sided. My coffee pot was clean and filled. So I started toward the door.
"At one time people such as William Faulkner wrote novels on the bathroom walls, but we now have nothing comparable."
pleas must be stamped out. Call attention to errors and shatter their comments with your pen.
As I turned, the man grabbed my arm and said, "Son, you're young and can't sense the importance of this, but we must not leave our wit at
the bathroom door. Ignorance, even on these walls, must be abolished."
“What are you saying,” I asked. “This whole idea of intellects taking back the bathroom is absurd. You seem to think the world is at stake.”
"The world is not at stake, but opinions are," he said, calming down.
"Nothing is really important, nothing. But why must people be subjected to the frantic misgivings of society? Can't we have varying opinions?"
Words tend to fly by without refutation. We question without response. Some things, of course, require no response. Yet if an issue is important, varying opinions are mandatory.
I haven't changed drastically because of the scene. I don't run with glee to every stall in town, but I want to do something. But I have realized something.
I broke away from his nonsense, and I sincerely thought it was all nonsense. But the man's face kept coming back to me. I could not help
Ideas must fly freely. Perhaps we must become as adamant as that old man about ideas and opinions. In any case, the writing is on the wall.
Pay raise criticized by senator
WASHINGTON — To his ever-lasting regret. Alan Simpson, the soft-spoken Republican from Indiana, entered the Senate chamber.
"I never heard so much guff in all my life," Simpson concluded.
After listening to the speeches,
Simpson uncoiled his 6-foot-8 frame
and gave his succinct opinion of the
raging debate.
Specifically, the resolution before the Senate would rescind a pay raise
STEVE GERSTEL
United Press International
The topic of the debate into which Simpson blundered concerned money — the root of all evil in many cases and also in the Senate and House.
Nothing — not budget details, not spending cuts, not military outlays can make the Senate agonize as members question of members' pay.
for members of Congress. The increase, totaling slightly under $2,500 a year for each of them, automatically into effect on Jan. 1.
And almost nothing can reduce the level of debate, which is not always that classv at best, as quickly.
In this case, the original peripherals were Sens. Don Nickles, R-Okla, Jake Garn, R-Utah and R-Kola. They offered the pay cut resolution
Nickles and Boren, without a wink of the eye, said that by returning the pay scale to $68,000, the Senate would lead the way in making the needed sacrifice to balance the budget.
"I think this is just unadulterated malarkey," opined Sen. Howard Metzenbaum, D-Ohio.
But then Metzenbaum, a wealthy man, could not leave well enough alone. He had to, as he often does, keep going.
The Ohio gadfly proceeded to charge the resolution's sponsors with lack of "courage" for not taking the lead in closing tax loophole, cutting down on the numbers of assaults and cutting defense waste.
Garn told the senators what he has told them before when the question of pay has arisen: "I do not have wealth. I do not have an inheritance. I do not have a rich wife. I have seven kids and three of them are in college and number four will be in college next September."
Unlike Nickles and Boren, Garn did not consider the pay rescission a "signal" of sacrifice to the nation. He objected because it went into effect without a vote while Congress was on a lengthy recess.
But Garn's longtime crush has been against limits on honoraria while the wealthy members can pay and dividends without disclosure.
"Baloney," he said. "If this were not the floor of the Senate, I would use another word that starts with B but would not be acceptable. I think everybody knows what I am talking about. The first part of the word is 'bull' and I will leave off the last part."
After Garn finished, Simpson said,
'I kind of wish I had not wandered
by. I did, unfortunately.
"I have always voted against pay increases, but it is true I have always taken them," he said.
He also said, "I heard another part of the debate. I heard the words 'crass' and 'crude' enter the debate, and I would certainly say it was."
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Self-centered lifestyles
To the editor:
The manner in which Helaine Kaskel condoned non-therapeutical abortion on behalf of a typical of women is not always clear.
She suggested non-therapeutic abortion as a solution to the public shame that would result from "the whole town" knowing that the "nice girl" was pregnant (surprise, surprise; there can be some unexpected consequences to extramarital sex.)
What is a non-therapeutic abortion? It is an abortion performed, not to ensure the life or health of the woman, but rather because of her desire for convenience, absence of distress, and her need for privacy and confidence with. "It's so simple, like remembering an unshyly war. Now you're pregnant... now you are not."
What about medical facts. It has been medically proven that the baby's heart starts beating from 14 to 28 days after conception (that's before the mother even knows she's pregnant).
The baby moves its arms and legs by six weeks and its brain waves can be read by 43 days. By eight weeks the baby has its own fingerprints and can feel pain.
What about the possible after affects. Legal abortions are not as "safe" as the public is misled to believe. It increases the possibilities of future pregnancy, e.g., in cases of severe and severe long-term employment disturbances.
Perhaps a future article could inform us about the techniques used in abortions (also include the
numerous babies who survive the abortion and are left unattended to die).
Perhaps she could write about the thousands of couples who wait years to adopt an "unwanted child."
It is obviously not the infant's happiness and well-being that she is concerned with, but her own convenience and lack of willingness to accept the capabilities that are a consequence of her actions.
Doug Henslev
Kansas City, Mo., sophomore
Center helps students
To the editor:
The AEC maintains a high quality of teaching on its staff.
In the Jan. 24 issue of the University Daily Kansan there appeared an article that suggested that the Applied English Center occasionally has caused foreign students to remain in AEC classes and forfeit places in regular classes by miscalculating their proficiency test scores.
Since the AEC exists and will continue to exist to fill a need which foreign students have, to learn at
I taught English at the AEC from fall 1982 until fall 1983. I now have another job. I was not fired, but I found another, better-paying job.
As with the rest of the University, the AFC faces a dilemma: it is at once orphaned with a needed business and a profitable business.
least enough English to be able to comprehend the cassettes which many of them depend on in order to transcribe word-for-word every lecture, the center has to make enough of a profit to at least pay its instructors.
Apparently, this happened once this semester. In case any of your readers were led to believe that the AEC uses dishonest tactics to keep you from using a device would like to present my viewpoint on that matter.
As far as test grading, I will report here how it was done during the 16 months I was at the center. Each multiple-choice section of the test is graded twice by each of the two graduate assistant graders, whose scores must coincide or be-re figured.
The essay portion of the test — which I might add reflects a recent trend toward such tests, even in the areas of science, to discern whether a student has learned more or less covered by three different graduate assistant graders.
Teachers are allowed to argue in favor of their students all along during this process, and carefully compare the students' performances on the test and in the classroom. Where discrepancies appear, retests are often given, or the student is given the benefit of the doubt.
There are so many checks within the grading process itself that anyone should be able to see why AEC Director Elizabeth Soppela was surprised when an error did occur.
The center has helped a lot of foreign students, especially those who stopped feeling offended at having to study English and began to work hard at the university language to do well in their planned KU class work.
Robert Bruce Scott
Robert Bruce Scott Great Bend graduate student
1
V