Opinion
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
United States First Amendment Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 1,2009
WWW.KANSAN.COM
Shorman: More sleep leads to higher GPA
PAGE 5A
FREE FOR ALL
To contribute to Free for All, visit Kansan.com or call (785) 864-0500.
EDITOR'S NOTE
An offensive statement was inadvertently printed in Friday's Free for All. The Kansan does not endorse such comments and apologizes for its publication.
Free for All, everyone keeps on making fun of me for wearing Crocs. But I keep trying to explain to them that because they have Jayhawks on them they are my rock chalk jay-crocs.
www.shaveitorbraveit.com
— Check it out. It's legit.
--vice provost for student success, 90 percent of students at the University are admitted to receive a degree. Out of this percentage of degree-seeking students, far less actually make it to graduation. The problem lies with incoming students who are not fully prepared for college academic standards
Is it an oxymoron to have a wake up call from a dream?
--vice provost for student success, 90 percent of students at the University are admitted to receive a degree. Out of this percentage of degree-seeking students, far less actually make it to graduation. The problem lies with incoming students who are not fully prepared for college academic standards
Vaginas are disgusting. They are like dungeons of disease.
Welcome to Lawrence, Kan. with the shortest green lights in town
All my friends have gotten in the Free for All but me, so I am hoping that you will write this down
--vice provost for student success, 90 percent of students at the University are admitted to receive a degree. Out of this percentage of degree-seeking students, far less actually make it to graduation. The problem lies with incoming students who are not fully prepared for college academic standards
You know what? Hill no.
Ew, Free for All, I'm in Missouri and all I can see are camo, cut-off T-shirts and cars that say "get 'er done." Somebody please help me.
Hey, here's some advice:
If you have enough taste to recognize that a guy is a bro,
you should probably have enough taste to realize that he's not worth a thought in the first place.
Say what you will about the hours, but where else can you have a job where you spend an entire shift watching "Dawn of the Dead" and discussing zombie survival plans?
Seeing your comment in the FFA is ten times more exciting than a Facebook notification.
--vice provost for student success, 90 percent of students at the University are admitted to receive a degree. Out of this percentage of degree-seeking students, far less actually make it to graduation. The problem lies with incoming students who are not fully prepared for college academic standards
To the girl sitting in front of me; Just start talking to me. please?
--vice provost for student success, 90 percent of students at the University are admitted to receive a degree. Out of this percentage of degree-seeking students, far less actually make it to graduation. The problem lies with incoming students who are not fully prepared for college academic standards
I am going to go to massage therapy school!
--vice provost for student success, 90 percent of students at the University are admitted to receive a degree. Out of this percentage of degree-seeking students, far less actually make it to graduation. The problem lies with incoming students who are not fully prepared for college academic standards
I'm not gay, but my girlfriend is.
I'm so tired of people talking about Uggs. Come on, everyone knows they are ugly, just stop whining about it.
--vice provost for student success, 90 percent of students at the University are admitted to receive a degree. Out of this percentage of degree-seeking students, far less actually make it to graduation. The problem lies with incoming students who are not fully prepared for college academic standards
Say no to swine flu. Spread jungle fever instead.
--vice provost for student success, 90 percent of students at the University are admitted to receive a degree. Out of this percentage of degree-seeking students, far less actually make it to graduation. The problem lies with incoming students who are not fully prepared for college academic standards
EDITORIAL BOARD
Raising admission standards will benefit all students
The Kansas Board of Regents should raise admission standards for incoming freshmen at the University to benefit all students. Raising admission standards would help to eventually raise national rankings as well as ensure that new students are fully prepared to enter collegiate academia.
Gaining admission to the University is not seen as an achievement in the eyes of incoming students, but instead as a fallback choice.
Even so, 20 percent of the freshman class drops out by the end of first semester. The parallel is clear: It is easy to get in, easy to drop out. Retention is key to raising graduation rates. And raising graduation rates is key to higher rankings among other public universities in the nation
According to Marlesa Roney,
Students who achieve just one of the University's admission standards can simply coast through the rest of their high school career, and right into the fall semester. These requirements are an ACT score of 21 or higher, rank in the top third of graduating class or a 2.0 GPA in the Qualified Admissions
"I think they need to be changed." Roney said of admission standards. "I believe that it is important for students in Kansas to have a better understanding of what it takes to be successful."
pre-college curriculum.
However, an important distinction needs to be made between having higher rankings as a goal or as a result. Changing admission standards with students as the first priority will eventually result in higher rankings for the University, but the benefits for students along the way are endless.
"When we admit students we are making a judgment that they can succeed." Chancellor Bernadette Gray-Little said in a speech on May 30. "And, I think the process of admission is one in which we want to be deliberative, in which we look at students, at their preparation."
KANSAN'S
OPINION
Roney agrees that changing admission standards is not to be taken lightly. She said that any changes would have to "assess students' willingness
to work hard" and "readiness to be in a college environment."
The Kaisai agrees with Rolley — that judging a student's ability to succeed is "not a college test score, but more or less a concept of academic maturity."
In 1996, according to kansas-regents.org, Kansas changed its admission standards from an open policy to a qualified one. This means that just more than a decade has passed since Kansas has had any sort of admissions criteria for incoming students.
Roney said another pivotal change was made during the spring semester. Previously, the state required legislative action to change any admission standards at public state universities. Now, admission requirement changes have been delegated to the Kansas Board of Regents. A task force has been set up to assess the effectiveness of current standards and to propose changes for the benefit of the University and students
However, there is no quick fix in the business of changing admission requirements. Any changes approved by the Board of Regents cannot go into effect for four years to give high school students time to adjust to the new qualifications.
Students need to be prepared to face a new challenge in coming to college. The University is foremost an academic institution concerned with student success in life after graduation. Admission requirements should be raised as a way to prepare incoming students, and to look forward to higher national rankings in the future.
— Kara Walker for the Kansan Editorial Board
THINK ADMISSION STANDARDS SHOULD BE RAISED?
Contact The Kansas Board of Regents www.kansasregents.org/contactboard (785)296-3421
FROM MASSACHUSETTS
The truth about Twitter
Our generation has never really lived without the Internet. Online fads com
MAGGIE LIU
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
The Tech
internet Online fads come and go (remember MySpace?) but in recent years the Internet has seen an explosion of dynamic services.
In fact, there seems to be so many means of connecting to people virtually that it has become overwhelming.
What exactly sets Twitter apart from the dozens of other social networking systems out there? Aside from the obvious catchphrase name, I'm puzzled by Twitter's hype and popularity. .
Twitter has received a great deal of media attention — and usage
— due to its use as a publicity mechanism for both celebrities and politicians alike.
President Obama used Twitter frequently during his 2008 presidential campaign, and celebrities such as Oprah Winfrey boast more than two million followers. But as far as I can see, the only reason I would get it is to follow the tweets of the "Twilight" cast.
It's not that we're becoming any less of social beings — it's merely that our socializing methods have transcended actual reality. And with these new methods come all forms of online etiquette that must be observed.
While it is impossible for me to deride all forms of social networking websites, I admit that Twitter does reflect a lot about our generation's lifestyle.
Twitters' popularity also underscores our decreasing attention span. Think about it. We went from blog entries to Facebook posts and now to two line messages?
The heart of the matter is that Twitter exposes every moment of one's life to others.
Although users can set Tweets private, the concept of Twitter is what irks me the most. Isn't it better to be living the moment, instead of twittering about it? Who are you living for? Yourself or your followers?
To avoid these issues, I think my fall semester resolution will be to abstain from these "social networking" sites and revert to that primitive communication system we call "e-mail."
— UWire
No excuses for being uninformed
STUDENT LIFE
"What are you supposed to know then?" I asked in reply.
I remember asking one of my Asian friends if she knew who the Kansas governor and University chancellor were last year. "Who would know that?" she asked. "It is a question for journalism students like you, and those who eat newspapers every day." I was stunned.
Information circulates so fast that anyone can reach almost anything. However, people haven't paid enough attention to what's going on in society. In Macau, China, my hometown, I find this to be a common trend among teenagers. They even feel proud of their poor social awareness. What's the problem?
"It's not my business to know about taxes, the fluctuation of housing prices, insurance and stuff like that," a 12-year-old boy once told me. "My parents will take care
I believe it's a matter of the stability of life. Macau is a relatively stable society. Kids are materially rich and lack a global perspective. They truly believe that "no news is good news."
of them."
That reasoning might be right for a child, but not when that child grows old. I'm not saying everyone has to be a genius, but we cannot shut ourselves into our own worlds and forget about the larger society.
To be honest, I'm not sensitive to current affairs. Reading newspapers and watching news reports were never part of my daily routine until last semester when it became part of my homework, which helped me with my coursework and enhanced my social awareness significantly.
Last summer I realized the importance of being informed of global news while working in the publicity department of my dad's election campaign. On the first day of work my supervisor told me to
go through our history of legislative elections and the background information of our organization. While doing this I realized my poor understanding of my father's work and our society as a whole.
Because I paid more attention to international news in my first two years of college, I had a hard time adjusting to life in Macau.
It was shameful to say that I am a Macanese.
"This information is just common sense to us as they are what our work is based on," Jill Wong, a policy researcher for my father's campaign, said. "You can't be a kid all the time."
When you step into the job market, you may miss the days of being a student. Learning is a life-long and endless process. Treasure your opportunity to be easily accessible to information.
By the way, do you know who our new chancellor and Kansas governor are?
Ho is a Macau, China, junior in journalism.
EDITORIAL CARTOON
The flu scare:
A good excuse to stay in your pj's all day.
MARIAM SAIFAN
LGBT
Let's make a list of everyone God hates, shall we? God hates: Fags, Jews, Greeks, Feminists, Jayhawks, Liberals, Conservatives, America, you, me and everyone we know.
Weapon of choice against God-fearing preachers
Okay, I'm exaggerating, but you get my gist. God hates everyone, or so people such as Brother Jed preach. If you were on Wescoe Beach last Wednesday, you probably saw our recurring, fear-God-or-go-to-hell visitor preaching about loving Jesus while damning 99.9 percent of the world.
You also would have seen the students standing near him holding up paper signs, occasionally shouting phrases such as "I heart vagina" and taking pictures with Brother jed to point out the ridiculousness of the situation.
Since when has anyone ever ignored a yelling match? Never. You stay and watch. It's exciting! So, a big crowd of students holding crude signs and jeering at a man who is already making a spectacle of himself just brings him exactly what he wants: an audience.
Though I'm clearly not a believer in this man's hateful way of preaching the word of God, nor do I believe that all of those listed "damnables" are going to hell. I'm also not a fan of how some of my fellow students responded. I'll admit that I have the urge to go up and yell at people who say such deplorable things and make God out to be some kind of being to be feared instead of loved, but that's exactly what they want.
My fellow students, this is my plea to you as a gay person, as a Jew, as a flaming liberal, as
a Jayhawk, as a living, caring, breathing, loving human being. The next time this man or someone else comes onto campus and launches into a puerile tirade, I beg of you, walk past in silence. Do not give them more than a glance. Our silence speaks volumes louder than our mixed cries. How erie would it feel to have this one man spewing his idiotic mumbo-jumbo with no one watching or with any other sound combining with his?
Ask any professor who has lectured and received little response or a comedian who makes a bad joke: Silence is deafening. If you don't want to see this man or others like him return to campus, I ask you to consider silence as your reaction to his noise. I have spent four-plus years on this campus and 14 in this town. I've seen plenty of Brother Jed and others like him and have always walked by quietly.
His message is not one I believe in. In my plea, I'm not asking you to defend me or my beliefs. I'm just asking if even a small part of you disagrees with the way this man abuses God and your fellow human beings to walk away from him.
Just walk away.
Bornstein is a Lawrence senior in sociology and women's studies.
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THE EDITORIAL BOARD
Members of the Kansan Editorial Board are Beena Hawley, Jessica Sain-Baillard, Jennifer Beyer, Caitlin Thorburg and Michael Holtz.
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