KANSAN
Thursday, September 26, 1968
79th Year, No.8
The University of Kansas—Lawrence, Kansas
--by United Press International
UDK News Roundup
N.Y. teachers head back to classrooms
NEW YORK—Mayer John V. Lindsay and the Board of Education acted Wednesday to end a nine-day, city-wide strike by teachers engaged in a power struggle with Negro administrators of a Brooklyn school district.
The board ordered the teachers to return to classrooms Friday under assurances that more than 100 union members ousted from the Brooklyn schools would be given back their jobs and protected from retaliation threatened by some black militants.
Public defender appeals nurse slayer's sentence
SPRINGFIELD, Ill.—The Illinois Supreme Court was asked Wednesday to spare the life of Richard Speck, condemned for the killing of eight nurses, so that scientists may study him and "prevent future crimes of this type."
Speck's attorney, Cook (Chicago) County public defender Gerald Getty, appealed the conviction and sentence of the Texas drifter for the slaughter of the nurses in their Chicago dormitory apartment in July, 1966. Speck, 26, has been condemned to die in the electric chair. The appeal of his conviction and sentence is mandatory under Illinois law.
Negroes set up school
Blacks leave LHS
By MIKE SHEARER Kansan Staff Writer
There were fewer black faces among the more than 1,500 white faces in Lawrence High School today.
Following yesterday's walkout from Lawrence High School, by about 50 of the school's 75 black students, the group met with parents and other members of Lawrence's black community to form a revolutionary new black school.
Merger with Voice topic at SDS meeting
Members of Students for Democratic Society (SDS) last night discussed several methods how they and members of Peoples Voice might coordinate their activities this year but accomplished little except for the formation of a few committees and election of one officer.
Proposals were raised at the SDS general meeting, held in the Kansas Union, for a merger and a joint newspaper with Voice, but the proposals were left undecided as were many organizational details including committee structure, financing and leadership.
Committees dealing with "problem areas within the American system" were formed and some of the 50 persons attending the meeting volunteered to serve on them.
The SDS "problem areas" included black power, Vietnam, neocolonialism, the draft, and communication with the average student—residence hall, fraternity and sorority residents."
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Black students left the high school early yesterday after presenting administrators with a list of eight demands, calling for more black teachers, an "equal chance" at high school royalty nominations, a black history course and a different method of choosing cheerleaders so that a black cheerleader might be elected.
Several Negro parents agreed to support their youngsters' battle against administration "indifference" and policy "discrimination."
Black students decided to meet at the home of a student, Elaine Williams, 878 Elm, at 9 a.m. today and begin operation of a "symbolic black school" with five Negro volunteer teachers, some parents and some teachers.
Students were undecided late last night as to when they would return to school.
Lawrence High School Director Max Stalcup, acting in the absence of Principal Bill Medley who is in Minneapolis, said the administration would not discuss the student demands until students had returned with their parents for readmittance.
Black students and parents meeting last night at Ballard Community Center in North Lawrence decided not to return individually to school but rather to wait until Medley returns to Lawrence and offers to meet the blacks en masse.
"If we start sending them back to school one by one, they're going to make fools of us one by one," said Negro student Rich Dowell, 782 Locust.
Vanessa Collins, 400 Illinois, said Stalcup "took out his handkerchief and blew his nose, then walked away from us," when the students presented the demands to him.
Among the impromptu classes the students were to hold today was Black History, a course promised to the students last April when similar demands were made.
"The books for the course are in his (Medley's) office collecting dust because he says we don't have a teacher to teach the course," Miss Collins said.
Lawrence High's only black teacher, Leonard Clark, said earlier yesterday that he would favor a different system of choosing cheerleaders. He said they should be chosen as athletic teams are chosen for their talent and by qualified persons. Cheerleaders are elected by the student body.
Planned committee may reach ghettos
Plans for KU involvement in nearby urban areas are now being drawn together by a University-wide committee.
Kansan Photo by Greg Sorber Rev. Tom Rehorn
Religion school will host course on white racism
By Diane Samms Kansan Staff Writer
"Nigger" splashes across the brochure cover. Almost as if they were an afterthought, the words "white racism" peek out from the corner.
The brochure, distributed by the University Christian Movement (UCM), publicizes a four-week indepth course on white racism which will be in October.
Tom Rehorn, Jr., campus minister of the Wesley Foundation, said the idea for the course came from reading the report of the National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders and from the UCM format of the campus ministry's involvement in social issues.
The course has a threefold aim: to encourage real study of the issue; to provide an atmosphere in which persons can discuss the issue freely; to provide a base from which to deal with the problem of racism in the University.
"The University does not offer a course specifically dealing with the problems of white racism," Rehorn said. A student can emerge from KU well-versed in Aristotle, he said, and still think Negroes are inherently inferior.
Rehorn sees this course as an indication that the Church is "genuinely interested in the University." UCM is a new organization nationally and at KU. Denominations in the KU group are American Baptist, Episcopal, Presbyterian, Disciples of Christ, United Church of Christ, United Methodist, Lutheran, and Roman Catholic.
The course reflects the UCM principle that the campus ministry includes students, faculty and administration. "We think we may have found, at least for this year, a good form to replace the old, institutional structure of the campus ministry." Rehorn said.
Each course registrant will attend two weekly meetings in October—one lecture meeting and one discussion group meeting. The Sunday lectures from 7 to 8:30 p.m. in Smith Hall, the School of Religion, are designed to provide stimulus for
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WEATHER
Continued fair and mild today, tonight, and Friday. West to southwest winds, 10 to 20 miles per hour today.
The group, tentatively named the University Committee for Urban Action, has been in existence since last summer with the approval of Chancellor W. Clarke Wescoe, according to Charles D. Kahn, dean of the School of Architecture and Urban Design.
Kahn, chairman of the committee, said official recognition by the Executive Committee of the Faculty Senate is necessary before formal operation can begin.
Already planned by the committee are:
- An "advocacy planning program," which will offer services of the University to ghetto residents.
- A scholarship and remedial education program for disadvantaged potential college students.
- The development of an interdisciplinary curriculum for the study of urban problems.
The committee meets Friday with Clif Conrad, Bismark, N.D., senior and president of the student body, and Joe Goering, Moundridge senior and vice-president of the student body, to discuss student representation in the group.
Kahn said yesterday he was awaiting word on preliminary activities toward the formation of the first advocacy planning center in Kansas City. Kahn said the advocacy center would be a storefront operation staffed by volunteers from KU to provide advice and service to inner city residents.
So far only business and architectural services have been included in the program, he said. The School of
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