4A = THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
OPINION
TUESDAY,OCT.16,2001
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KNIGHT RIDDER TRIBUNE
EDITORIAL Open House brought new students to KU
The University of Kansas hosted an Open House on Saturday October 6 for alumni, KU students, prospective students, and members of the Lawrence community. The event was a good start toward establishing an Open House that shows off the Universities attributes to the state and all prospective students.
Marguey Frederick, associate director of admissions and coordinator of the KU Visitor Center, was also pleased with the results of the Open House, but admitted that it was difficult to measure the amount of people who came. Frederick is optimistic about the Open House becoming an annual event, and has been pleased with the amount of positive feedback she has received.
Kansas State University has organized an Open House every spring for twenty years, and many believe it has helped the enrollment and awareness of the university. This would be another useful tool for KU to use to help its enrollment and recruiting. The event was scheduled on a weekend in the fall that would not conflict with football because in order to provide free parking for the Open House. Ideally, the Open House would take place on a day with the football game that night. However, football game times are tentative and can be changed at the last minute.
As a result, the Open House will be held annually every spring. This is good and will be memorable for students, alumni, and community members.
The Open House was privately funded through KU Endowment money; no state funding was used. The initial cost was $30,000, but the advertising costs brought the total to about $40,000.
The KU Visitor Center did a great job of advertising for the event. They sent out 5,200 flyers to students in Lawrence elementary schools. To appeal to high school students, they sent out 1,500 posters to principals in the state of Kansas. Since the date was set, there have also been fliers at every college fair that KU has attended advertising the Open House to prospective students. For alumni, there was an ad in the Kansas Alumni magazine. Ads were placed in many western Kansas newspapers that had strong KU alumni communities. Many radio ads were aired throughout Kansas, and Internet ads through the Kansas City Star were placed to help advertise also. Advertising through TV was too expensive to fit in the University's budget.
PERSPECTIVE
Next year, KU hopes to draw more prospective student groups from Kansas City, Topeka, and all of Kansas. A goal for next year should also be how to reach out to more out-of-state prospective students. Frederick hopes that KU students and student groups take a more active role in the Open House next year to draw even more people. Different alumni groups can also organize themselves to set up events at the Open House.
Molly Mueller for the editorial board.
serupers Overall, the KU Open House was a success, and can become an important tradition for the university.
Mr. Rogers leaves gap in TV opportunity for parents
Fred Rogers of Mister Rogers' Neighborhood has packed up his cardigans and moved home. Rogers is leaving the TV neighborhood after 30 years and taking his navy canvas boat shoes, along with his true love for the welfare of children, his integrity and his simplicity, with him.
As Rogers retires, he leaves the children in the hands of their parents, believing he has fought the good fight and given us the tools we need to be good moms and dads. He showed us the values of love and respect and encouraged all who would listen to continue to fight for child-friendly television. He's taught us what he can. He's handing the baton back to us. Let's hope we'll pick it up and run.
Rogers said he got into television in 1954 because he hated it. He told CNN that he thought there must be some way of using TV to nurture those who would watch and listen. And that is what he did. When the outside world was chaotic, Rogers gave children peace, security and comfort through a simple format based on the same routine show after show.
His program may have seemed sappy and simple to older children or adults, but Rogers knew what he was doing. His main audience was preschoolers and their parents, and the show was definitely not shallow. He taught both young and old how to deal with death, divorce, sibling rivalry and violence.
For example, after the Columbine school shootings, Rogers was asked in a CNN interview how parents could explain the massacre to their children. He said, "Those children need to know
Dawn
North
Columnist
opinionanan.com
Commentary
that the adults in their lives will do everything they can do to keep them safe. It doesn't mean we're always going to be successful, but it does mean we're going to try."
That is why one of Rogers' goals was to reach the parents. He told Christian Century magazine in a 1994 interview, "Children see television much the same
Rogers has pleaded with the television industry for years to remember the children when planning its programming. But it has been in vain. The 1998 Federman study, which looked at 23 cable and television networks over three seasons, found that preschoolers who watched two hours of TV a day would witness 10,000 violent acts each year. Saturday morning cartoon shows, the baby sitter of young children, have the highest rate of violence, with 25 violent acts committed per hour.
Experts are now giving similar advice to parents after last month's bombings. Parents should be upfront and honest, but information needs to be age-appropriate. It's best to watch television with them so parents can explain what is happening. And, finally, parents should pay special attention to their children. That is what Mr. Rogers has been telling us all along.
way they see a refrigerator or a stove — it's something that parents provide. In a young child's mind, parents probably condone what's on the television, just like they choose what's in the refrigerator or on the stove. That's why we who make television for children must be especially careful."
Some argue that just because children are exposed to violence, it is hard to determine the effects it has on them. And they're right. It is difficult to prove cause and effect. Isolating the effects of media from the effects of all other factors in life is nearly impossible.
Mr. Rogers has retired. He's done what he can. He's used the medium of television for good and taught the parents well. Now it's up to us. Yes, networks need to rethink what they put in our living rooms. But if they don't parents need to hit the off button on your remote control and haul out Candy Land.
But that doesn't mean we can't use common sense to figure out that violence on television can't be good for our kids. That's what Mr. Rogers, also a Presbyterian minister, has been preaching to us all these years. It's what the studies have shown us. And it's now what we're learning for ourselves.
We have made television the surrogate mother of our children. And now it's time for parents to take up their roles again. The savior of our children is not a man dressed in a green zip-up cardigan and tennis shoes. We are the ones who will save and preserve our children.
North is a graduate student in journalism from Lenexa.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
TRUSTING THE NEWS
At first glance, Luke Daly's article on freshmen BOCO elections ("Freshmen use skin to win," Oct. 11) had the makings of a good article. Conflict, timeliness and, of course, bare skin.
Dear editor.
However, a third of the way into the article is a statement that is flat-out wrong. The Campus All-Stars are Greek sponsored. Each candidate is a member of either Phi Delta Theta, Fiji, Chi Omega or Pi Beta Phi.
Daly had observed the situation and even quoted a member of the Campus All-Stars. This raises the question of trust. If I can't trust a Kansan reporter to get the facts straight and I can't trust the Kansan editing staff to catch mistakes, then why should I even bother to read the campus newspaper?
Lauren Airey
Lenexa freshman
Editor's note: A correction run in yesterday's paper. The error was due to misinformation from a source.
OLD WEST LAWRENCE ZONING
Dear editor
The Old West Lawrence Neighbor
hood Association and property owners invite the Kansan readership to support the rezoning of western Old West from RMD (duplex) to RS2 to save historic homes from future demolition. Andy Davies' piece of Oct. 9 was inaccurate.
No duplex will be torn down.
Every duplex is grandfathered in.
Large homes that are now duplexes
will remain so.
The target area is Alabama through Arkansas, Sixth to Ninth streets and only that part zoned RMD. Areas zoned for apartment, rooing house or commercial are not included.
The great asset of this nongeneric place is its diversity of ages, races, occupations, politics and housing, and especially its threatened stock of small affordable homes so coveted by students. The present 26 percent duplex indexes our zoning is obsolete. We now need to save our historic buildings for all.
- Rental homes are safe. No landlord will be required to reconfigure a building or change its usage.
- No student housing will be lost; much affordable housing will be saved. We love students and their grandmas here.
Allen and Angie Blair, co-presidents, OWL
Ann Goans, task force chairwoman
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FREE for ALL
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ror more comments, go to www.kansan.com.
To the person who picked up the black wallet with the red sticker on it in the hall of Budig, please return it to me; I'll give you a reward. Thank you.
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to that guy who played at the Jazzhaus a couple weeks ago on a Thursday, oh man, I love them purple drums.
Barry Bonds: 73 runs, Michael Rigg: Insert foot in mouth.
What's sad about Toni Braxon is that her voice is so deep that you could actually mistake her for a man named Tony.
The perfect way to catch Osama bin Laden:
give him an invitation to host Saturday Night Live. Who can pass that up?
题
I am 21 years old and male and proud to be watching—and loving—the Dawson's Creekseason premiere because Joey Potter is hot when she joigs.
Yeah, for anyone who saw the Dawson's Creek season premiere, whose dorm room looks like that? Joey has these like 6-foot windows, and she's got like nine of them. Whose dorm room looks like that?
It is OK to throw things at Andrew.
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And now, a toast to bread, for without bread, there would be no toast.
Carrot Top, you’re affecting my life in a negative way. Make it stop!
So I met the perfect man for me and I've been in sheer happiness since I met him and I think I'm gonna keep him.
resh, um, i think my roommates like each other in a different kind of way.
Is it wrong to go to McDonald's and get nothing but the free water?
I'm at AMC 30 sitting next to the devil and he's playing Pong. What is with that?
I just want to comment on the whole terrorism thing and just say, what did we do?
I really feel sorry for the poor sap who's got to sit here and listen to all these stupid comments by the entire student body. Your job sucks, man.
My roommate's throwing my pet pig at the wall and won't give him back.
I'm in a sorority and right now, me and my roommates are having a naked pillow fight.
Hello, is this *TRL*? Could you play "Bombs over Baghdad?" It's an oldie but a goodie. Oveh you, and Carson, you're really hot.
How did the wife know that the husband got her 2-year-old son drunk?
He went to bed with his ugliest stuffed bear. I hope my roommate sees this joke because it reminds me of him. Even when he's not drunk.
What do you mean it was only a one-night stand? I thought we were in love.
I just want to thank the Jayhawk Towers for the increase of roaches and insects still running around our kitchen, even after being exterminated two weeks ago.
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I just want to thank the University Daily Kansan for providing me with essential news once I realized the restroom I was in out of toilet paper.
I really don't think that we should have to watch the baseball playoffs in Spanish. This is Kansas. Get real.
My throat hurts. I wish I could go to Watkins but I don't have any health insurance.
There's definitely something going on out there.
I haven't seen my roommate in seven days and I just wanted to tell Scott I still are alive.
My throat hurts. I wish I could to Watkins but I don't have any health insurance.
its refreshing mild foaming gel leaves your skin feeling fairly cleansed, soft and comfortable.
Are those mirror pants? Because I can see myself in them.
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College is supposed to be where all the smartest people come and learn a bunch of stuff. If that's true, how come there's so many people walking around smoking. Well, see you at your funeral.
What if Free for All cost money? Then what would it be called? Not Free for All?
There's no sex in the champagne room.
Never call Piy; amid Pizza and ask for a small bag of cheddar cheese for $2.