SAN
2008
OPINION
5A FRIDAY SEPTEMBER 5, 2008
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
International grad students deserve on-campus housing
In the game of musical apartments, most graduate students weren't even allowed to play last spring at the Jayhawker Towers. That's because the Department of Student Housing approved substantially fewer housing applications from new graduate
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DSH's justification reveals insufficient planning and consideration. It fails to take into account that many graduate students in the Towers are international students who don't have cars and are new to the United States. Nearly one in five graduate students who live on campus is an international student, according to the Spring 2008 demographic report released by the University.
"You have to cut back somewhere and graduate students are more prepared to adjust. They're older and more mature," said Diane Robertson, DSH director.
applications from new students to make room for ongoing renovations at the Towers that will be completed around Fall 2012.
Whereas graduate students got the ax, the
number of housing contracts given to new athletes and new undergraduates remained similar to pre-renovation figures. The disparity was by design.
Without the Towers, international graduate students have been left with no viable on-campus living options.
It is important for the University to provide these students a communal environment thats inexpensive and close to campus.
OUR VIEW
Stouffer Place Apartments, which are adiacent to the Towers.
are given primarily to students with families. And although graduate students are technically allowed to live in the dorms, very few do, and there's little wonder why — the freshman atmosphere isn't compatible with the heavy graduate workload.
Also, international students tend to eat foods from their native country, and the dorms don't provide adequate cooking facilities. On the
DSH knows better than to alienate international graduate students. It should've put undergraduates on the Jayhawker Towers chopping block instead.
other hand, each apartment in Jayhawker Towers includes a kitchen.
Undergraduates have a multitude of living options that international graduate students don't. Undergrads can live on Daisy Hill, in a Greek house or off-campus because many undergraduates own cars. There also aren't as many international undergrads — these students make up only 4 percent of the undergraduate population.
Reserving space in the Jayhawker Towers for international graduate students during the remaining renovation years and beyond is of utmost importance if the University wishes to continue attracting this vital sector of the student population.
The only other option was to exile the athletes, but this didn't make sense when they practice across the street.
—lan Stanford for the editorial board
LETTER TO THE EDITOR
Use point-spread system for 'Kick the Kansan'
In response to the "Kick the Kansan" picks, this is a great idea and very interactive.
However, there are some inherent flaws in the way it is set up. The games picked are mostly big name teams against terrible teams. This takes almost all the skill out of picking the games. Even without the help of any outside information, when you see one team ranked in the top 25 against a team with no numbered prefix, you have a good start to go with the ranked team.
This is common sense. And while not every one of these ranked teams wins, it is very close. Out of last week's 10 games, only two were upsets. Of those two, one was a game with two top 25 ranked teams playing against each other: No. 24 Alabama vs. No. 9 Clemson. The other game was unranked UCLA at home, beating No. 18 Tennessee.
If you are at all familiar with sports, you know sportsbooks make odds to make the matchups even. One glance in USA Today or at a Web site will show you the point spreads and "moneylines" on these games.
Of last week's games, only
three were below a seven-point spread. Although those games have the potential to go either way, the only upset outside of those games was UCLA, a 7.5 point underdog, over Tennessee, a more than 3-to-1 favorite to win. Even though seven points may not seem like a lot, when you have a team favored more than three to one, it actually is a big spread.
Instead of wasting half a page with four sports editors nearly identical picks — only four of the 40 game selections were dissimilar in week 1 — it would be much more interesting to see who is picked when spreads come into play.
I would like to propose using a point-spread system to pick the games. This essentially gives each game a 50/50 chance of being correct. Four of last week's games were double digit favorites. This week there are three, with one game at 9.5.
This will drastically lower the total number of correct choices, but at the same time, it's almost not fair picking seven of 10 games when one team is greater than a three to one favorite. This would make this section much more fun and interesting for everyone.
—Max Wescoe, junior from San Diego
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THE EDITORIAL BOARD
Members of the Kansai Editorial Board are Alex Doherty, Jenny Hartz, Lauren Keith, Patrick de Olivaire, Ray Seebepp and Ian Stanford.
This group has a right to free speech, but it shouldn't be manipulating this right. The psychological and emotional damage to a woman walking by these signs who has had an abortion could be enormous. Whether you are pro-choice, pro-life or pro-shut the hell up about it, using graphic images of this nature is wrong.
One of the reasons KU Students for Life thought it needed this group on campus is because "facts about abortion are not talked about in academia," according to a posted letter. Isn't part of being an adult and going to college having the right to choose what you learn about? Students have the right to choose their own majors and their own classes. Is Students for Life arguing that there should be an "Abortion Is Murder" 101 class?
superficial sentence: "Slavery was once a legal choice." Equating the two is revolting. The group also compares its quest to Susan B. Anthony's quest for the right to vote.
These violent images contradict their message of peace and life. These displays do not portray the pro-life message in a positive way.
How can abortion be compared to slavery?
Having these messages in front of Strong make it look like the
Thornbrugh is a Lenexa junior in creative writing.
No matter what side of the pro-life vs. pro-choice argument you are on, forcing these pictures upon unsuspecting students is wrong and unnecessary. A healthy dialogue is not possible when these grotesque graphics are shoved down our throats. A volunteer with Justice For All, the Wichita-based group displaying the images, gave me a pamphlet with a complete representation of its display, and it is hard for me to even read the text because of the pictures.
Walking to class Thursday morning, I was greeted by the "Graphic Photos Ahead" signs near Strong Hall. Those signs seemed funny to me after I looked up and saw the two-story-high pictures of bloody fetuses. The pictures were unavoidable. Even if you crossed to the other side of Jayhawk Boulevard, the graphics were so large the scare tactics still reached you.
"The stance from the Commission on Status of Women is that abortion is a woman's health issue and that making them illegal forces them into dangerous situations when trying to obtain one. It is up to the woman to decide the fate of their families and their future. This ridiculous circus display is obscene. It sends the wrong message about KU. We hope KU students are smarter than this."
Some students who saw the display yesterday fought back by creating their own displays. Samantha Snyder, a senior in English and history, was working at a small table set up next to the giant displays. She works for the Commission on the Status of Women.
"We were met with a bit of opposition, and we had to fight tooth and nail to get this here," said Mary Millard, president of KU Students for Life, a nondenominational prolife student organization.
The arguments on Justice For All's displays are offensive. The group compares the legality of abortion and slavery in a simple,
University endorses this message.
Another volunteer, graduate David Lee, said the group couldn't have a table on Wescoe because other student groups already had them reserved.
KANSAN FILE PHOTO
Here's some of the most important information that you may have missed from this week's local news. Check out kansan.com for full stories and to leave comments.
The University shut down one of the longest traditions on campus because of the higher price of natural gas needed to operate the whistle. The University should seek out a donor to finance a more environmentally friendly steam generator that doesn't require natural gas. Check next Wednesday's Kansan for a full-length editorial.
ASSOCIATED PRESS
THE BIG PICTURE
The estimated amount in dollars that it costs the University each time the steam whistle goes off.
THE CONTEXT
The number of missed appointments at Watkins Memorial Health Center every year.
THE BIG PICTURE
Watkins hopes to have a new appointment system in place in a year that will work in the Kyou portal to allow students easier access to appointments, prescriptions and lab results. Missed appointments cost students about $40,000 a year. This should be a godsend for those of us who haven't yet mastered time management and agenda books.
THE CONTEXT
ASSOCIATED PRESS
THE BIG PICTURE
Percent that Westar customers' electricity bills could increase by if the Kansas Corporation Commission approves the rate proposal. This would increase the average customer's bill by $10 each month.
Westar said it needed the money to make investments in new natural gas and wind plants. More higher prices hurt customers' already aching pocketbooks, but this may be the push Kansas needs to begin conserving.
To contribute to Free for All, visit Kansan.com or call 785-864-0500.
I just saw a guy with the emblem of Superman tattooed on the back of his neck. Religious
--when to stop class
My compliments to the Athletics Department for planting those trees around the practice field. It wouldn't occur to anyone that they could walk up the hill to see the field even better.
So many schools sing to their fight song. Why don't
--when to stop class
--when to stop class
--when to stop class
Styrofoam. The silent killer.
Because people can barely clap to it.
--when to stop class
I love Muse. You should too.
--when to stop class
I miss Brother Jed.
The Dryer Gnome can be defeated by using safety pins to keep your pairs of socks together
--when to stop class
Maybe I should work more, but for now I'm OK with living off chocolate milk and hot dogs.
--when to stop class
--when to stop class
Word of advice, avoid going to Zig and Mac's on a Friday and popping your gum because an old man will curse at you for it and cause a scene.
It's extremely ignorant to think marijuana can't be handled responsibly and legally, just like alcohol.
--when to stop class
I am amazed at how many people on this campus haven't matured past middle
--when to stop class
My orange was almost good today. Just a little more until I overdose on some deli- cious vitamin C.
--when to stop class
I prefer not to.
--when to stop class
Don LaFontaine, the voice for all of the movie trailers, died. The world will be a much less epic place.
--when to stop class
Try standing in a Guatemalan chicken bus for three hours on a mountain highway with cliffs on the turns and then talk to me about the K-10 connector being unsafe.
--when to stop class
The University needs to take that $3,000 it saved by not blowing the whistle and buy all the teachers watches with alarms on them because none of them seem to know what to do.
--ugly we're making.
People forget how beautiful the world is because we're all so concerned about how only we are making it.
@KANSAN.COM
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