More time studying, less time looking up babies of instagram accounts.
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Sometimes I wonder, how long should
I leave these burritos in the toaster
oven? Like, right now I think that.
opinion
A word of advice: Don't listen to Drake and drive because you'll end up at your ex's place.
Text your FFA submissions to 785-289-8351 or at kansan.com
TEXT FREE FOR ALL
Just a little side note, if you cough anywhere in my vicinity and don't cover it, I will feel obliged to hurt you.
Gerber sent me a letter offering life insurance for my kid. Instead of worrying that I've impregnated someone, I sighed with the realization of how long my drought has been.
WEDNESDAY OCTOBER 9, 2013
Dibs on the gypsy long boarder. I'd love to be your sidekick :)
"I love getting honked at while walking to class," says no girl EVER!
How many times do I have to express my love for ginger men in the FFA until one shows up on my doorstep?
To the person submitting comments from Reddit and Imgur, I am on to you.
Monopoly should have an embezzlement card that reads "Take all the money from your neighbors, go to jail for 1 turn."
Ripping the Constitution and KU in the same FFA. Bold choice. Editor, I would've denied his free speech but clearly you love the Constitution.
EDITOR'S NOTE: Amen. Big fan of freedom of the press as well.
Saying that Battenfeld is good at sports is like saying that K-State knows how to play basketball.
According to my math teacher "Euler" is pronounced the same as "Hola."
Days when you don't have homework are more stressful than the days you do, mainly because you become super paranoid and feel like you're forgetting everything.
I redeemed my student tickets! It was only slightly more difficult than doing my taxes.
There is never a day without homework. Even when you think there is.
That's a lie.
I hate walking by Wescoe because then I have the uncontrollable urge to eat Chick-fil-a.
I've literally never met a communications major. Do they exist?
There was a spider on the INSIDE of the my truck's windshield, so I drove it off the nearest bridge — into the Arkansas river.
'Opportunity hoarding' further widens social gaps
Do you deserve to be here? Do you deserve to be a student seeking an education at the University of Kansas? Most would argue, "Yes, I have a pulse." But beyond that, the combination of your high school GPA, ACT score or other abilities probably indicated you could handle college to some degree. While it's great to be a jayhawk, it's definitely not exclusive — our admission rate exceeds 90 percent. On the other end of the spectrum, Harvard's admission rate hovers around 6 percent. Not everyone can attend Harvard, just like not everyone can claim a judicial clerkship or have inside referrals to top Wall Street firms. These chances are scant; the demand far exceeds the supply.
But what if there was a factor that would increase your odds of getting into Harvard five-fold?
Youd want to know what it was, and how you could add it to your resume. Unfortunately, it's like the weather — completely out of your power. Increasing your acceptance chances to 30 percent requires you to be a "legacy"; meaning one of your parents attended the renowned institution.
If one of your parents attended Harvard, you probably had plenty of resources at your command. It's regrettable that someone else who had fewer resources doesn't receive this boost.
But thus begins the story of "opportunity hoarding." As Charles Tilly coined it, opportunity hoarding occurs when "members of a categorically bounded network acquire access to a resource that is valuable, renewable, subject to monopoly, supportive of network activities and enhanced
by the network's modus operandi,network members regularly hoard their access to the resource, creating beliefs and practices that sustain their control."
So this basically involves the "haves" keeping what they have from the "have-nots." Although elite institutions provide excellent opportunities for upward social mobility with scholarships for financially-needy students, they also continue the tradition of exclusion by giving preference to legacies in the admissions process.
What's wrong with this? Well, for more upward mobility to occur, there must be downward mobility from the top. But the people at the top hold on and avoid sliding down the clute, even when they deserve to descend. Social stratification will not even out if the affluent refuse to let their own fail. If they hold onto these prestigious internships, jobs and options, how can the lower or middle class (the categories most of us belong in) ascend? There are fewer and fewer opportunities for upward mobility when the wealthy salvage these spots for kin. Opportunity hoarding shifts social mobility for those going down and those attempting to go up.
So how are you affected? Well, maybe you missed out on a job because it was awarded to someone with a better network. Or maybe you were denied admission
to another institution because a child of a wealthy alum filled the last spot. On the other hand, it's also possible you benefited from such opportunity hoarding. Maybe you received a job because your parents knew someone. At that point, it's convenient. But under John Rawls' "veil of ignorance," you probably want to see fair policies based on merit implemented. Rich kids who don't perform as well don't deserve preferential treatment over smarter, poorer kids just because of their parents. Departing from social inequality will require society's affluent strata to stop hoarding opportunities for those who deserve to fail, and cede them to those who are deemed deserving by talent and performance.
Anrenee Reasor is a junior studying economics and EALC from Thayer.
Poor sidewalk etiquette contributes to bleak world
I there's one major complaint I have about the University of Kansas, it's the state of our sidewalks. Not our well-maintained facilities, but the inhabitants of those sidewalks. I'm talking about you
I'm talking about you.
Consider this my open letter to every pack of pedestrians shuffling along like zombies. I'm going on the record to say that if we hired a few hundred people to spank us every dozen feet or so, wed have a much more punctual student population.
There's something uniquely frustrating about being stuck in a pack of phone drones that are shuffling along listening to Wizard Khalifa or what have you. Youd think all of the hype tracks would get people to move faster than one mile per hour.
My temporary solution for keeping our walkways clear will be to tackle slow people from behind. I'm still trying to decide if I'll scream bloody murder as I take them down. I don't want to give them a chance to react before we hit the deck but I think it magnifies the impact. I'll suffer an injury or two no doubt, but I've weathered worse getting out of the bath tub.
Don't get me wrong; the problems don't stop at sluggish walkers.
People who ride their bikes on the sidewalk: What is wrong with you? There's some leeway back home where there weren't thousands of students crowding every inch of asphalt. But here, it's a different story. I've seriously considered kicking in the spokes of more than a few bicyclists trying to jerk their handlebars between arms and shoulders of the sidewalk horde.
Get back on the street and stop trying so hard to look like you got farted out of a Jack Kerouac novel.
I won't say they aren't necessary, but the maintenance workers who drive those robot war machines right up alongside the concrete? They are absolutely terrifying. I'm not asking the
University to get rid of them but at least let me fire back with a water balloon or two. It would help my peace of mind and make lawn care fun for everyone.
Despite all my gripes with daily life, I can't help but think that if I were a little bolder or even just a bit meaner that I wouldn't have these constant problems. Be it sidewalks, hand-washing or reading quietly in the library, if I had a bit more sass, I would probably be a load happier. I act all high and mighty when I'm given the podium here, but out in the real world I'm just a nervous pedestrian skittering between openings in the crowd and trying to work up the courage to shush people in Anschutz.
the problems that plague us every day can be called at worst a minor annoyance and at best the "quirks" of daily life. As big of a bummer as it is, the best I can do is whine and give offenders the stink eye. For now, I'll work on my tackling form and start installing tripwires. Stay on your toes, people.
Wil Kenney is a junior majoring in journalism from Overland Park.
CONNECTIONS
Friendships deserve same effort as relationships
CAMPUS CHIRPS BACK
This weekend, I had a much needed "girl talk" with my three best friends. We all got under the covers (wait, is that weird?] and talked about our dramatically dysfunctional lives. We, of course, laughed at our troubles instead of trying to actually fix them.
It had been a while since we had gotten together, so while I was driving back home, I began to realize that those little moments are the times that I live for. While some of you may consider that to be kind of pathetic, I feel as though I've been undeservedly blessed. I know that I feel so much better after I spend a day unproductively laughing and telling the worst jokes with my fellow comedian-wannabes.
I have come to the conclusion that a great number of girls my age, myself included, put too much effort into trying to obtain a boyfriend or keeping a hold on the one they have. However, lately I've begun to see that the most important people in my life are my friends, which some people probably look past as well. Why don't we try as hard with our friends? Why is it easier to throw them to the curb when they hurt us?
Some of my biggest regrets in life are the friendships I let fade away or those that I threw away for no reason at all. My advice is to work on every relationship in your life. Let the ones you love know that you love them, because you don't know if they'll be here tomorrow.
You should treat your friendships as carefully as you would a romantic relationship. What a lot of us forget is that friends are the constant in our lives. While
By Molly Smith
msmith@kansan.com
bouncing from boy-to-boy, our friends are there through it all. My best friends are the people that I always fall back on, even when that "amazing" boy wasn't so amazing after all.
In any relationship, you have to give just as much as you take, as I'm sure you've heard an obnoxious amount of times in your life. But it's truer for friendships than anything. Your friends should know that they can fall back on you, just as much as you fall back on them.
I know my friends will make fun of me for everything I've written in this article because I'm never this mushy or serious. I like to laugh and I like to be goofy, because that's what life is about. That's what I look for in friendship and I think a lot of people would say the same.
The point I've been trying to make is not that you should disown your significant other (sorry if you have already sent that break-up text), but that you should make sure that your special someone can resemble someone similar to your best friend. And if you don't have a significant other, don't worry about it — you probably have amazing friends right in front of you who care about you just as much as any boyfriend or girlfriend ever would. So go have a lazy Sunday with your best friends and stuff your face, because those are the things you will miss when you're older.
I feel like my relationship with the FFA is similar to that of a girl. Once I get in, I stop trying.
Molly Smith is a sophomore studying speech pathology from Lenexa.
What's the most annoying type of pedestrian on campus?
Follow us on Twitter @KansanOpinion Tweet us your opinions, and we just might publish them.
@ TomasGonzalez
@KansanOrionn The Tim Hardways: That's when you walk straight into someone and they fake left, fake right, then go left again & do u dirty
orkanbanUnion Professors. They all have those rolling backpacks that take up 1/2 the sidewalk and they walk super slow. #SorryNotSorry
@SaraHettenbach
HOW TO SUBMIT A LETTER TO THE EDITOR
Travel Grant, editor-in-chief
editor@kansan.com
Allison Kohn, managing editor
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@KansasOpinion The Great Wall: A slow-moving impenetrable pack lined up across the width of the sidewalk.
@Corey_Fidori
Length: 300 words
The submission should include the author's name, grade and hometown. Find our full letter to the editor policy online at kansan.com/letters.
@KansanOpinion The ones that see your car coming, wait until you're close, and THEN cross the street. No. You saw me. I will run you over.
@elenacleaves
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