CAMPUS/AREA UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Wednesday. September 16. 1992
3
Kip Chin / KANSAN
Rough around the edges
Jay Browning, Lawrence senior, does detailing work on a project for his beginning sculpture class in the Art and Design building. Browning used a model shoe as a guide to sculpt a larger version.
Dean questions survey method
By KC Trauer
Kansan staff write
Robert Jerry, dean of law, yesterday said he objected to some of the methods used in a March 1991 Kansas Bar Association survey of students' perception of gender bias in Kansas law schools.
One of the survey questions asked students, who answered anonymously, whether gender bias was a problem. Thirty-five percent of the 353 KU students who responded said gender bias was not a problem.
Twenty-five percent said it was a problem rarely, 11 percent said seldom, 19 percent said occasionally, 7 percent said frequently and 3 percent said always.
In Spring 1991, a KBA task force studying the status of women in the law profession surveyed law students from KU and Washburn University on issues of gender and racial bias.
Survey results showed similar responses from Washburn law students.
Jerry said he was concerned about the survey's methodology because the data could be interpreted to draw many conclusions.
For example, it could be said that 90 percent of the students found gender bias a problem never, rarely, seldom or occasionally. Another interpretation could find 29 percent reporting that the problem occurred occasionally, frequently or always.
Jerry also said that many of the questions were phrased vaguely and that some terms, such as gender bias, were not defined.
Students gave mostly positive views of the law school in a Fall 1901 survey
The firm conducting the survey, Central Research Corporation of Topeka, could not be reached for comment.
The fall survey, organized by a law school committee, asked students to respond to the statement "The relationship between faculty and students is positive." Forty-two percent strongly agreed, 45 percent agreed, 7 percent had no opinion, and 6 percent either disagreed or strongly disagreed. Jerry said.
specific questions on gender bias were not included in the fall survey. The committee organizing the KBA survey replicated the KBA survey. Jerry said
Even before the KBA report was published, the law school implemented several policy changes and programs to address the gender bias issue, Jerry said.
Jim Concannon, dean of Washburn law school, said that Washburn also had implemented programs dealing with the issue and that the KBA survey served the law schools well.
KU custodian to have HIV tests after being stuck by needle
Some programs are designed to inform every student about how to file sexual harassment grievances and to teach men's problems women face in the profession.
Other custodians working at KU residence halls have been inflicted with such medical burdens by simple harm from the possibly dangerous needles.
By Christine Laue
Some residents who use the needles for insulin or allergy shots do not dispose of the needles properly, said Ken Stoner, director of student housing. Some students toss used needles in
A hypodermic needle pierced a rubber glove and stabbed the hand of a Lewis Hall custodian two weeks ago as he moved trash. Now, the custodian will have to undergo blood tests every six months for the next 10 years to check for the HIV virus.
Kansas staff writer
garbage cans or residence hall trash shoots.
"Occasionally one of our people will get cut or pricked while handling trash," Stoner said. "It happens from time to time."
He said that students probably did not think that other people had to deal with the needles after they were thrown away.
Calista Orent, nurse at Watkins Memorial Health Center, said some students might not want to take the time to dispose of the needles properly.
She said people should dispose of needles by placing them in glass containers, such as pop bottles, and taking them to Watkins. The Watkins staff puts the needles in a special container, melts them down and takes the melted material to Lawrence Memorial
Orent, also a member of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration committee at the University, encouraged students to dispose of the needles properly. The OSHA committee was formed to ensure that state employees who are exposed to blood and other bodily fluids have proper protection.
"They can tell them and ask them, but they may not do it," she said. "We have no way of policing it."
But nobody, including the student housing department, can force the students to take the safety precaution. No laws or regulations regarding needle disposal exist, she said.
Stoner said that fiers requesting proper disposal had been posted but that housing had no way of contacting needle users directly to address the problem because medical information was confidential.
"We can't require it and we can't act on that information," Stoner said. "We just have to rely on general notification."
But Joan Ahmed, an Oliver Hall custodian who was stuck by a hypodermic needle last spring, disagrees. She said student housing should do more to educate students.
"They should talk to the people who are insulin dependent," Ahmed said. "They shouldn't have this casual attitude about it."
Ahmed agreed that students were
the main people who could prevent accidents like hers. When a needle stabbed her last spring she was not injured. Her husband, the custodian who recently was injured.
Unlike the Lewis custodian, who was picking up individual pieces of trash after they fell from a trash shout. Ahmed was carrying a garbage bag when the needle punctured her thumb.
"Wearing gloves doesn't protect you anyway." she said. "Sweaters can penetrate."
Stoner said that because needles were designed to puncture tough surfaces, a glove that needles could not penetrate was difficult to find. The housing department is looking into purchasing steel mesh gloves that
possibly would be safer. He said that the department provided the best protection it could.
Kip Groshans, personnel director for student housing, said some of the more protective gloves were heavier and would make the work more tiresome for the custodians. He said the Lewis custodian followed proper procedure for moving the trash.
"Whoever put that down the shoot was not following the rules," he said. "And doing that showed a disregard for the health and safety of someone else."
Christian groups sponsor national prayer
Almed, whose ongoing blood tests are paid by the state through an insurance plan, said that she was angry at the person who threw away the needle that stuck her.
Kansan staff writer
By Muneera Naseer
This morning at 7, a group of people from various on-campus Christian organizations prayed at the flapcode in front of Strong Hall, as part of "See You at the Pole" day.
The National Network of Youth Ministries, Youth for Christ, Student Discipleship Ministries, Student Venture and Fellowship of Christian Athletes, all high school groups, sponsored the nationwide event, along with 20 religious denominations
The event was started in Dallas in 1898 by Christian high school students as an informal gathering to start the academic year, and gradually has spread across the United States.
"This year the people backing the event are extending and trying to get college students and adults to be involved also," Wendy Cross, a member of KU's Baptist Student Union, said.
Cross said she heard about the event at a youth camp and contacted about 16 Christian groups on campus to raise interest.
Cross said the event was a united effort by Christians who were following a biblically prescribed solution for crises facing the United States. She said that they prayed for 53 people who were facing problems like alcohol and drug abuse and domestic violence.
"It's not a demonstration or protest," said Cross. "It's not an equal rights rally, a publicity stunt, a patriotic rally or an alternative to prayer in school."
But the event has not always been free from controversy because some people believe no public places should be used for prayer.
Last year, two students were taken into custody in Metropolis, Ill., for refusing to leave the prayer site when ordered by authorities, said Jay Sekulow, chief counsel for the American Center for Law And Justice.
He said the situation resulted in a lawsuit that was still pending.
American Civil Liberties Union of kansas and Western Missouri, said that if the event was sponsored by students there was no constitutional problem.
"The campus is a public place, and students are free to be there." he said.
Cross said that if any law officer were to have asked them to leave the prayer site, the group would have left because no one wanted to cause any disturbance.
Dick Kurtenbach, executive director of the
People who attended were to be given cards on which they were to write down what they wanted to pray about. The prayers of each person were then to be read out loud. Cross said that students at Lawrence High junior high schools in
Cross said that students at Lawrence High School and at the junior high schools in Lawrence were to hold a similar event.
Mike Jordahl, arepresentative for The Navigators, a KU religious organization, said that two to three million people nationwide were expected to have taken part in the prayer.
The Associated Press contributed information to this story.
Photographer claims are in error
By Lynne McAdoo Kansan staff writer
Residents of scholarship halls and fraternities were confused when they received a letter from a local photography studio.
The letter stated that University Photography, 2449 Iowa St., was the official photographer for the Jayhawk yearbook and that it would provide a free 10 inch by 18 inch framed group picture for the hall.
But for the past two years the official photographer for the yearbook has been Carl Wolf Studios in Pennsylvania. The last time University Photography was the yearbook photographer was during the 1989-90 school year.
"I had no idea what was going on," said Roger Shepherd, president of Battenfield Scholarship Hall. "I thought it was bad organization. Because of it, we were honestly looking for an outside source to take the pictures."
"I am upset and distraught," he said. "We don't operate like that.
"We have made a mistake saying we are the official photographer for the yearbook. We had no right."
Tony Schmidt, co-owner of the studio, said he did not know the letter had been sent.
Schmidt said that the person who drafted the letter used a letter that was sent three years ago as a pattern. The employee was not aware that University Photography was not the photographer for the yearbook this year.
"I intend to get out a letter retracting that we are the official yearbook photographer," Schmidt said.
Amy Stout, managing editor of the Jaya-hawker, said she wished University Photography had researched before they sent out the letter.
"The only real danger would have been if money had exchanged hands," she said.
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