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University Daily Kansan Monday, May 14. 1956.
concerned I am very sorry. BEE
The ASC's Evaluation Program
The Big Chance-Don't Goof
Outspoken critics of the All Student Council may have to withdraw a few of their comments toward the failure of the ASC to provide any sort of legislation which benefits the students if the ASC-sponsored faculty and course evaluation program manages to live up to its possibilities.
In this program students will at long last have a chance to gripe with a chance of getting their complaints heard by someone besides the folks and fellow students.
For as long as we can remember, we've had some ideas about what's wrong with certain courses, and about what professors could do to improve both the course and their own methods of teaching. Now, the evaluation plan offers a chance to do something about it.
In the first place, the student should strive to be fair and accurate in his comments. Forget about how that teacher sent your parents a down slip when you were only three measly points below a C at mid-semester. Don't let the fact that you've neglected to study interfere with your judgment of the teacher or the course.
For you we've been granted a privilege-one which could mean a great deal to students now and in the future. If you louse it up by making a joke of it, it may not be granted again in the future. If you really have an honest gripe about a course or instructor, say so, but don't go wild with emotional exaggerations.
Admittedly the student has no guarantee that his criticism or comment will be considered, and there is even less chance that his criticism will be adopted. However, it's still nice to feel you're getting voice in the way the class is taught, even if that voice is only a whisper.
As we see it, both the students and faculty members have an obligation to fulfill in this evaluation program.
And the faculty members also have an obligation. The evaluation is being conducted for the
benefit of faculty members, not just as a sounding board to give the students a chance to air their gripes. But unless the faculty members read the comments of the students, and seriously consider them, the ASC has been wasting both time and money.
We realize that some students will greatly misstate and exaggerate their protests, both toward the course and its teacher. But this must be taken into account, because it's the first chance the students have had to do anything like this for a long, long time.
So, as we said before, both students and faculty members have their responsibilities. The students must use as much thought and self-restraint as the nearness of final week will permit, and the faculty members then owe it to the students to carefully consider all suggestions.
Only if this is done will the program be a success. It looks like something which would be nice to have around in the future, but if it's abused this year, we may never get another chance. Let's take advantage of the big opportunity.
Dick Walt
There's a new traffic sign across the street from Flint Hall which warns, "Watch for Pedestrian." Someone should inform the company in charge of making those informative signs that with the parking situation the way it is here, the word "pedestrian" can never be correctly used in its singular form.
You don't realize how much of a blessing all the recent rain has been, for it keeps the building and grounds department from playing their nasty little "drown the student under the sprinkler" game.
The only thing we can imagine which would cause more sorrow than the whistle's laryngitis would be for the campanile to be silenced.
Book Review
Some Of Adlai's Mistakes In 1952
"Major Campaign Speeches of 1952" by Adlai E. Stevenson is a collection of 50 speeches of the author during the campaign. The speeches are highly entertaining and very constructive, especially because they are much of what he talked about during the campaign.
One thing which Mr. Stevenson points out in the introduction is that he had not campaigned in the primaries and that his views as well as himself were little known around the country. We tend to agree with him on this point.
Here was a man who was not too well-known, who had not sought the Democratic nomination for President, and who had said that he didn't even want it. He was pitted against a Republican who was a war hero and the idol of millions of Americans. Had the author been opposing any other Republican candidate, I don't think that he and the Democratic party could have been beaten in 1952.
A Poor Policy
Another thing which hurt Stevenson is the election was his war record. He mentions several times in the highest rank he attained in World War I was apprentice scaman, and that his military career was brief. I think that this was very poor strategy in that his opposing candidate was a general with a long and glorious military record.
The people of the United States have seen two world wars come and pass, and are facing a possible third one in the future. Considering that the President is the commander-in-chief of all our military forces. We feel that Mr. Stevenson should not have mentioned his poor military career.
One place where the author completely thrilled us was his views on the Korean War and his rebuttal of several statements by Mr. Eisenhower about that war. Ike stated that the Democratic government grossly underestimated the Soviet threat, allowed America to become weak, and abandoned China to the Communists.
We agree with Stevenson in that as good a job as could be
expected was done. Sure, demobilization did go too far and too fast, but it would have gone faster if the Republicans had been in power. After all, between 1944 and 1946, they pushed demobilization to a greater degree than the Democrats.
It is true that the Democrats underestimated the Soviet threat, but didn't the Republicans also. Mr. Eisenhower even said after the war that there was no reason why the Russian system of government and the Western democracy "could not live side by side in this world."
Farm Vote Lost
Another place where Mr. Stevenson hurt himself in the 1952 campaign was in his loss of the farm vote. He was a governor of a great agricultural state, he owned farm land in Illinois, and he had come from a family that had lived in the heart of the Corn Belt for over 100 years. Mr. Stevenson tried to stay too much in the middle. However, had he made more promises and stressed in particular the question of farm income, he might have captured a larger part or maybe even all of the vote of the farmers.
Another place where he hurt himself was in the issue concerning Korean. Again, he tried to stay too far in the middle of the road, while Ike was making vote-getting statements. Ike told the people that he would actually go to Korea and get a first hand look at the fighting, so that a quick end could be reached. Mr. Stevenson says in his comments that he had actually planned to go to Korea, India, and Japan and look the situation over. However, we think that he should have made it an issue and publicized it to the people.
We have been telling why Stevenson lost a majority of votes, and
yet we still feel sorry for him. In looking over his speeches, we find that he is a man who is sincere, honest, and very capable of leading a nation as large as ours. He is a true and loyal Democrat who was faithful to the people as a whole, and who believed in the concept of equal rights for all and special privileges for none.
Had he declared himself favoring or opposing certain major issues, and had he not opposed such an enormously popular man as Ike, we feel Mr. Stevenson could have won the election and could have been a capable and honest President.
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