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University Daily Kansan Monday, Sept. 15, 1958
A Look at Freshmen
This is a standard, if exaggerated, opening-day editorial for college newspapers;
Welcome, freshmen. You have finished with youth and are entering upon a four-year adventure of the mind. Here at Oshkosh U., you will grow intellectually and socially, and be graduated ready to carve outstanding careers in society. . .
Unfortunately, we feel rather differently. These are our views on why freshmen enter college:
1. Parties.
2. Social climbing.
3. Husband-hunting.
4. Draft-dodging.
5. A four-year vacation with the privileges of adulthood and none of the responsibilities.
6. Education.
Excepting the small group here for reason 6, the new students will contribute little to the University. While they are here, they will be a nuisance to their betters, a drag on the scholastic standards of their schools, and trouble for the administration.
Some of the freshmen will join fraternities and (next year) sororites. Some will get involved with KU's own brand of shady campus politics. Some will make 3.0 grades.
They will fill our favorite bars with the noxious sounds of rock and roll, hillbilly music, and their own yapping voices. They will talk interminably at the drop of a cliche about psychology, sex, beer, sex, parties, sex, religion, fraternities, and sex.
By the time they are sophomores and upperclassmen, some of the rough edges will be polished, and they may even have acquired the habit of study breaks between beer parties.
Perhaps 10 per cent of this freshman class will get educations. About half of them will get degrees, but only 10 per cent will get educated. It is not a matter of grades, or memorizing dates or Shakespeare's plays, or computing pH factors. The problem is learning to think, independently, without guidance or pushing.
They will learn to avoid 8 o'clock classes, tough instructors, and the probation list. They will dodge closing hours, spike Cokes at some of our better roadhouses, and wear Ivy League clothes.
Not that a fourth of the freshmen lack the brains to do college work, but that many will lack the initiative and drive required to keep up.
And about 25 per cent of the class will be gone by next year. With a few regrettable exceptions, KU will demand a fairly high standard of scholarship from you, and a quarter of the class will fall.
College does not equate with rush week, necking parties, bull sessions on esthetics, or the social graces. If a student can learn about all these things and still get an education, fine.
But KU is here to provide educations for those who want them. The students who have come to KU for anything else are only in the way. They should learn to drive trucks or write shorthand, but they should not be here. The classrooms are crowded enough without them.
Salary Cuts May Cause...
—Al Jones
It seems strange that our state administration would want to cut the salaries of physical plant employees at the two institutions which bring the greatest status to Kansas.
Imagine the havoc which could be precipitated around the campuses of KU and K-State if employes' wages were reverted to the Civil Service rates, as was planned by the state finance council for Jan. 1.
First of all, campus employees will find their pay quite a bit below other workers in the Lawrence area. Then they will quit their jobs. And then the University will have a heck of a time finding replacements to work at substandard wages.
Closely following this catastrophe, the students will find themselves in trouble what with wading through tall weeds to get to classes only a little late; catching diseases from untended garbage piles; freezing in the winter; and so on.
But the nightmare might not stop there. If the proposed plan succeeds, the state finance
council could lose all caution and common sense (if there be any left) and demand a faculty wage reduction. Then all the profs and instructors would quit, leaving us without classes to attend. No classes—no students—no school.
And without students to kick footballs around, even Jack Mitchell might resign. That would make the alumni angry, and then where would we be? No money.
You see, all sorts of bad things can happen when the state finance council fails to think before acting.
Now, the only things we students can do about the coming situation are: (1) Let the Topeka council know how we feel on this issue, and (2) Refuse to vote for these individuals come next election if they refuse to lift the veils from their ordinarily clear and open minds.
It is a bum feeling knowing that our state is willing to throw a monkey-wrench into the educational picture right in the midst of America's big push. —John Husar
LITTLE MAN ON CAMPUS
"DON'T THINK WELL HAVE MANY STUDENTS THIS YEAR — NOT MANY INTELLIGENT ENOUGH TO GET THROUGH REGISTRATION."
Daily Hansan
Telephone VIking 3-2700 Extension 711, news room Extension 371, business office
University of Kansas student newspaper
Founded 1889, became biweekly 1904,
triweekly 1908, daily Jan. 16, 1912.
Member Inland Daily Press Association.
Associated Collegiate Press Repre-
mented by National Advertising Service,
420 Madison Ave. New York, NY.
Institute of Technology, international. Mail subscription rates: $3 a semester or $4.50 a year. Published in Lawrence, Kan., every afternoon during the University year except Saturdays and Sundays, University holidays, and examination periods. Expt. 17, 1910, at Lawrence, Kan. post office under act of March 3, 1879.
Maleolm Applegate -- Managing Editor
Leroy Lord, Pat Swanson, Martha Crosier, Doug Parker, Assistant Manager, Editors, Jack Harrison,
City Editor, Arlene Russell, Editor, Martha Pearse, Janice Howden, Assistant Society Editors: Bob Macy, Telegraph Editor; Jack Morton,
Assistant Telegraph Editor; Jim Coghill, Ron Culp, Assistant Sports Editor, Ron Culp,
Chief Photographer.
NEWS DEPARTMENT
EDITORIAL DEPARTMENT
Al Jones Editorial Editor
Bernita Dunn, Donna Logan, Associate
Editorial Editor, Logos
BUSINESS DEPARTMENT
Bill Irvine Business Manager William Feitz, Advertising Manager; Robert Lida, Classified Advertising Manager; William Kane, Circulation Manager; Clyde Boots, Promotion Manager; Dave Whalen, National Advertising Manager
It Looks This Way...
By Al Jones
The big news over the week-end was the Supreme Court decision on the Little Rock case—and its immediate consequences.
'Ol Orval, who claimed last year he was only preventing violence when he put his state Gestapo in front of Central High, is having a lot of trouble convincing people this year that he has the interests of anyone but 'Ol Orval and his rednecks at heart.
Now Orv says there would be violence if his high schools opened on schedule—integrated. Same song, second verse. Orv also says the Supreme Court is "unconstitutional" in voting against him. That's like a lawyer telling a doctor he's made a wrong diagnosis.
Sure, there might be a mob. Faubus has had a year to rouse the rabble. And the question of a state nullifying federal law was settled when Lee handed over his pay record at Appomattox.
Before the court decision, Orv came out with this gem: "I will fight to preserve the rights guaranteed to the people under the constitution."
When a politician starts talking that way, you're in trouble.
He doesn't say which "people" he's going to protect, but he seems to be thinking of white male Protestants—the ones who vote.
Ike said, referring to the same case, "If state officials will maintain peace and order, then lawless elements will not be able to deprive school children of their constitutional rights."
Sounds almost as if they agreed, doesn't it? But Orv is talking about the Arkansas constitution and his white constituents, and Ike is talking about the United States constitution and the Negro school children involved.
No matter whom they're talking about, Orv faces a contempt rap in federal court, since he was under an injunction not to interfere with integration at Central High. He's also been served a summons to appear and show why he shouldn't receive another injunction to keep him from closing school.
Of course, Orv ignored one injunction, so he may ignore the other if it is issued.
It appears, in the North at least, that the honorable governor of Arkansas is violating the law. It's also obvious that this is the way to get votes in Arkansas.
Both Ike and Orval have been re-elected, so they have no immediate worries about a job. Orval, I think, is looking ahead, probably to the U.S. Senate, on a program of illegal resistance to the United States government, a blind eye to progress, and a Southern dream of a return to pre-Reconstruction days.
Huey Long made the Senate, why not Faubus?