Opinion
Page 4 University Daily Kansan, November 12, 1980
1. 2. 3. 4.
A Grade C report
If KU has its share of pud courses, many students apparently aren't enrolling in them.
A report from the KU office of academic affairs shows that the grade-point averages of students have increased only .013 since 1970. Moreover, the overall GPAs at the University have decreased from 2.968 in 1974 to the current 2.793.
The report is significant because academic experts have lamented grade inflation for the past decade and have contended that professors are using more lax grading systems. KU appears to have avoided much of the grade inflation problem.
The reason, according to KU officials, is simple. For starters, the University's
strict withdrawal system makes it much more difficult for a student to drop a class. No longer can a student withdraw only because of poor performance.
The University's limitation on pass-fail courses also has helped prevent increases in the average GPA. Students can't avoid receiving more letter grades and to be sure, a few C's here or there can lower GPAs. That's what KU officials had in mind when they adopted the withdrawal and pass-fail policies.
The University's attempt to halt grade inflation is a necessary one. In order for KU students to be competitive on the job market, degrees need to mean something. Grade inflation hasn't made KU diplomas into meaningless pieces of paper. At least not yet.
Letters to the Editor
Senate's criticism of report gives free speech bad name
To the editor:
According to the Oct. 24 Kansan, the Student Senate Rights Committee adopted a report critical of the Blue Ribbon Committee's report on freedom of speech. This committee has also criticized that to advocate free speech while advocating limits on its expression is self-contradictory.
Such a view gives the doctrine of freedom of speech a bad name and is symptomatic of the utter confusion that characterizes most of the discussion of this controversy. If the doctrine of freedom of speech entails that there should be no limits on the expression of ideas, so much the worse for the doctrine of freedom of speech.
It has been effectively refuted. If anything at all is obvious, it is obvious that no one has the right to go to a class and to express himself in class by choosing on every occasion that classes meet.
It follows that we had better have a sensible formulation of the doctrine of free speech—a formulation that does not entail too much. If it does, it is the modern form of speech that rational people can adopt.
What can such a doctrine be? It helps in formulating such a doctrine to reflect exactly on what we take to be wrong with totalitarian societies in the realm of free speech and what sort of contrast we want in our society and especially in the academic community.
Surely freedom of expression should have at least the following two components: (1) One has the practically unhindered right to free expression in private and (2) There exist opportunities for the practically unhindered public expression of ideas.
That a reasonable doctrine of freedom of speech should be stronger than this is not obvious. Two things are clear: (1) It will take careful argument—not the usual ideological posturing—to show that the doctrine should be stronger and (2) The above doctrine does not get banners into the stadium at Commencement. Perhaps some student senators and others who deal in slogans should reconsider their views.
Don Marquis
Don Marquis Associate professor of philosophy
Blue jeans not so bad
"Trying to find excitement in the labels that
tell you about the song 'Sand Tall,' by Earth,
Wind, and Frost."
Somewhere along the road of life, Bill Menezes took a wrong turn. Not that there’s anything wrong with watching women in Calvin Klein jeans, it’s just that Menezes thinks women wear them to satisfy his far too inflated ego.
I happen to think women wear whatever they wear because it gives them confidence and self-assurance and reinforces their personal styles. Women wear such clothes in the real world of jobs, promotions and salary disputes, but if you've got something extra in your pocket, it helps
Sometimes that little something extra may be a Calvin Klein tag, but more often, information, and intelligent reasoning powers of the ability to communicate effectively.
If someone, like Menezes, happens to be impressed or awed by watching my Calvin Klein-clad body, fine. A moment's distraction is all the time I may need to work my proposals under the boss's nose and get the results I'm after. Because I think today's woman is after results, changes and a piece of the pie that's been on a man's table too long.
If wearing smart clothes gives me an edge, and obviously it must with reaction types like Menezes, then it's to my advantage. You see, Menezes and others like him, judge only the appearance of a woman. As long as the struggle is kept on that level, I'll be the winner because there's 100,000 merchants who can sell me the appearance I need.
I just happen to think that there's also a big market for Nobel-caliber research and if it happens to be in my briefcase you can bet it will get published.
Let the Menezeses of this world hang out at Wesco Beach. You'll find me in the library in my button-up, Levi, boot cut jeans preparing myself for the day I can turn a few company heads with either my Calvin Klein appearance or my research. As long as the heads keep turning I'll get what I'm after, and that means showing young men like Menezes the way to the door of the unemployment office.
Jennifer Roblez Emporia senior
Coverage pitiful
I am absolutely amazed at how a school newspaper manages to neglect important events that happen every day on our campus. I am also a school newspaper be book-oriented?
To the editor:
us, we are all interested in the Chiefs' game, but what about KU's Homecoming? It is hard to believe that the winning floats in the parade were only acknowledged by an ad put in the personalists. After all the time and effort that was put into these floats by various living
does the Kansan not consider this
treatment to publish the outcome?
Also there is the matter of intramural sports. Each week the Greek League and the Independent League have games but can one ever find an article that lists the scores of each week's games? Only at the end of the season, after much searching, can one find a small article informing us the outcome of the final championship game of the season. Much work is put into intramural sports, Homecoming and many more activities on this campus and the Kansan hardly even touches the surface.
Granted not every event that happens can be printed in the Kansan, but those that involve quite a few people on campus are must. How about letting the Kansan serve its purpose by being more school-oriented and allowing students to learn around them here on campus. If you want to read the world and state news, pick up a Lawrence Journal-World!
Editor Business Manager
Carol Beter Elaine Strahler
Managing Editor Cynel Hughes
Editional Editor David Lewis
Campus Editor Judy Woodburn
Sports Editor Gene Myers
Retail Sales Manager Kevin Koster
National Sales Manager Nancy Clauon
Campus Sales Manager Barb Light
Classified Manager Tracy Coon
Sandra Simon Shawnee junior
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Decade of struggle ravages Belfast
By KATE POUND
Guest Columnist
BELFAST, Ireland—Massive buildings, decorated with the gimarcackery of the Victorian era, rise gracefully above a modern pedestrian shopping mall. Boutiques nestle against churches in the city's heart and shoppers bustle about, not having to worry about traffic, and ignoring the soldiers who patrol, loaded riffles ready.
Belfast, one of Europe's youngest cities, it sprang up in the last century to become Ireland's industrial center. Money flowed in from England and other overseas countries, such as the famous Harland and Woyle ships.
Spreading out from the city's center are tree-lined streets filled with charming townhouses. Trendy shops and restaurants bring European and American chic to Belfast, and, we were it for the heavy wire bomb screens surrounding buildings and the guards who frisk customers, one might be tempted to think of Belfast as being any other lovely city.
But it is not any other city. Its residents are protected from themselves by patrols of young British soldiers. They cover the city, in groups of eight, spaced out along sidewalks, automatic cannon fire, and in some cases at soldiering; their eyes are alert, piercing at corners and glancing up to look for sniper.
Theirs is the most dangerous duty in the British Army. Their enemies are the Irish Republican Army and the Ulster Defense Association, the terrorist groups that have involved all of Northern Ireland in their battle against each other.
It has been more than a decade now that the British troops have been in Northern Ireland. They came to keep the predominately Roman Catholic IRA and the predominately Protestant UDA from destroying the six counties of Ireland ruled by Britain.
Catholics seeking better housing, better pay and more jobs from the Protestant-run government and business sector, began the battle between the two sides. In the 11 years of the "Troubles," as Irish on both sides of the border call the violence, there have been more than 2,000 people killed, 21,000 wounded and more than 6,000 separate bombings.
A civil rights movement in the late '60s, let by
But the violence had abated the past few years, bombings and killings almost halved. The British government began a slow pull-out of its troops, bringing the number of soldiers in Northern Ireland to half the 1974 level. Bombed buildings have been rebuilt, pedestrians walk more freely and development in downtown Belfast, even though guards search people for weapons at every shop entrance, has brought activity back to the city's heart.
Except for the members of the small terrorist groups, the Northern Irish have become tired of the violence. Improved social conditions have made it easier for politicians for an end to British and Protestant control.
Protestants, too, are becoming used to British rule of the North, although before the troubles, the Protestants had ruled Northern Ireland with a Parliament independent of Britain. A fragile trust seemed to have been achieved, a compromise between the polar demands of unification with the rest of Ireland and a local, Protestant-run government.
That truce, however, may not be strong enough to withstand the next few weeks. On Oct. 27, IRA prisoners in the British prison of Long Ketch, in northern Ireland, began a hunger strike. After demanding that they be treated as political prisoners instead of ordinary felons, the prisoners vowed to die if their conditions were not met.
The strike, named the H-Block strike for the prison section where the IRA members are held, has been threatened for nearly six months. The British government, clergy from both the
Catholic and Protestant churches and civil rights leaders have negotiated fiercely to avert the strike. Yet British concessions did not meet prisoner demands and the strike began.
Tension has increased daily in the last month, as leaders in Britain, Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland struggle to stop the strike. If the prisoners die of starvation, they will become martyrs to the IRA cause and Catholics in the North may rise violently.
If the British give in and recognize the prisoners as being political prisoners—giving them the right to wear their personal clothing instead of uniforms, exempting them from work and other prison programs—the UDA is likely to strike against the British and the Catholics.
Complicating the situation is the tension created by Northern Ireland's recession-ravaged economy. Unemployment overall is more than 15 percent; in many Catholic areas is reaches 30 percent. Unemployed Catholics, bitter and desperate, may use H-Block as an excuse to attack Protestants, who will fight back to save precious jobs.
It is a city under siege, Belfast. Attacked from within, it is to lay unarmed, waiting for the enemy to arrive.
It is a sin, a waste. A beautiful city is threatened with war. The British Army's bomb squad, who roars off in armored trucks to answer bomb threats, may be helpless against the enemy. The war will remain friendly people, willing to buy the rare foreign in Belfast a bellworm, will be torn farther apart.
They wait, now, for the battle many see as inevitable. With the Red Hand of Ulster, a symbol of Protestant domination in Northern Ireland, atooped on his hand, one British visitor confidently. "There will be a civil war. There will be a war." Good God have mercy.
Kate Pound, a journalism major, is studying abroad in Ireland.
Reagan, football may boost KU interests
Two positive signs have appeared recently for the KU athletic department: the KU football team's 3-4-2 record and the election of Ronald Reagan.
At first glance, the two hardly seem related, but they are both factors that could change the athletic department from a barely break-even operation to a financially sound one.
While a near .500 record is normally not viewed as something to cheer about, it is at Kansas, where in the past three years the team only only seven games while losing 25 and tying one.
What has been heartening this year is that the team has managed to be competitive in every game except against Nebraska. Three KU losses in three seasons in the top 10 in the nation at all time or another.
The play of Kerwin Bell—who has a shot at breaking KU's single season rushing record despite missing the Makhana game—and Frank Powell are good examples of fans, but also have insured hope for the future.
this has been reflected in the increased attendance at home games this year, a factor that certainly must be encouraging to Bob Marcum, KU athletic director. But even though KU has drawn 5,000 more fans a game this year than last year, the football program probably will still lose money because there was one fewer home game this year.
Overall, it looks as if Marcum's strategy of building a stronger athletic department by building a better football team may eventually work. If the team continues to get better and draw more fans, Marcum will have more money with which to work.
With renewed hope in the football program, the
athletic department could have even more reason to be hopeful because of the election last week of Reagan. He and his aides have been saying they hope to get Americans out from under some of the more restrictive government regulations. More likely, the Obama administration are probably hoping that he will take action to relieve them of some of the burden of Title IX regulations.
BRETT CONLEY
P
Title IX prohibits sex discrimination in institutions receiving federal funds. In the past, athletic department could have even more reason to be hopeful because of the election last
this has meant that athletic departments at universities that receive government money have had to provide equal opportunity for male and female athletes.
The University of Kansas is under investigation for alleged violations of Title IX guidelines. KU spends an average of about $200 more on a male athlete than on a female athlete in non-revenue sports such as golf, tennis, swimming and traineeship. The athlete has taken into account, because football players receive better treatment than other athletes.
Tl Hell "Pe bush
The government has threatened for several years to include football expenditures when taking into account the average expenditure on
each athlete. This would force schools to either pump a lot more money into women's sports or cut back on many non-revenue sports to be able to spend the average expenditure on female athletes.
Athletic departments such as KU's probably can find the money to provide equal funding for men and women in non-revenue sports. But the KU program may never turn around if money has to be diverted into it into women's sports to make expenditures for all sports equal.
If Reagan lives up to his promise of making government regulations less troublesome, the government may be less strict in Title IX interpretations and allow football expenditures to be higher than in other sports, because football support many non-revenue producing sports.
So overall, things look much brighter for the KU athletic department than they did in August. The football program appears to be making progress toward becoming respectable once again, and KU fans are returning to Memorial Stadium. This could bring in more money to the athletic department in future seasons allowing it to maintain a high quality football program and also maintain high quality in non-revenue sports, whose budgets depend upon football revenues.
The one thing that could prevent this is a strict interpretation of Title IX guidelines, which would force a school such as KU to curtail sports opportunities and divert more money to women's sports.
Yet with Reagan as president, there may be hope that KU's progress in football will not be even. Evidence of this would mean more money or even a higher athletic department, including women athletics.