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University Daily Kansan/Friday, October 4,1991
OPINION
300 level blow-off?
Policy for upgrading courses needs work
The problems associated with the upgrade of Geography 304 are unfortunate all the way around. It is tempting to begin pointing fingers, but the real challenge here is to find a solution to the mess in which the students, instructor and department find themselves.
Currently, the geography department is engaged in ongoing meetings. about the issue. Meanwhile the instructor is caught in a situation where she simply followed orders to upgrade a course that was far too similar to Environmental Studies148. Then we have the students—the people who are really lost.
Perhaps some of these students took the class because it had the reputation of being a "blow-off 300." Perhaps the
instructor went a little too far when she added advanced hard sciences to a course with no prerequisites. Perhaps the department of geography was not aware of the predictable result of their order to upgrade.
Upgrading a course that has no prerequisites, is being taught by an instructor new to KU and has an enrollment so large (more than 200 students) obviously requires a better system of checks and balances than has been employed in this case. Departments across campus and the administration itself need to take a good look at the policy that created this mess and at the solution the geography department uses to solve it. That this has happened is maddening; that it might
The feeling here is that upgrading is in accordance with the very essence of the University of Kansas. Prerequisites will have to be assigned. No longer is Geography 304 a class to kick back in. All students enrolled should have the opportunity to drop, and for those upperclassmen in need of this course-or one like it-individual arrangements need to be made.
happen again is inexcusable.
The last thing we need to do is criticize an instructor for following instructions and creating a challenging environment for University students.
Michael Dick for the editorial board
Research financing
Court ruling protects free speech in research
In a ruling last week of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, Judge Harold H. Greene set down what may be the beginning of an important precedent regarding freedom of speech for university researchers.
While this ruling may not be precedent setting, and it may be appealed to the circuit court or to the Supreme Court, it is important to realize the creeping censorship that may go along with government funding of research.
Greene ruled that the National Institute of Health must award Stanford University a $1.5 million grant for artificial heart research. The institute originally did not award the grant to Stanford because the researchers there refused to stipulate to a grant rule that barred them from disclosing research results until they were cleared by the institute.
Greene ruled this was an unconstitutional abridgement of the researcher's free speech rights guaranteed by the first amendment and that the university is a traditional sphere of free expression
fundamental to society.
He also noted that few large-scale endeavors today are not supported in some way by government funds and that to allow the restriction in this case would be an invitation to censorship wherever public funds flowed.
Greene's ruling should be hailed as an assurance of the free speech of university researchers relying on federal financing.
Benjamin Allen for the editorial board
LETTERS to the EDITOR
Cartoon demeans, stereotypes Jews
I write in objection to Michael Paul's cartoon published in the Kansan on Sept. 26. One need not hold any specific view regarding current U.S.-Israel relations nor be Jewish (I am not) to find the cartoon offensive and disturbing.
The cartoon resonates with false shibboleths about Jewish "control" (especially financial) of Western societies, labels current American lobbyists regarding Israel as exclusively Jewish (contrary to fact), and suggests that Israelis (and all Jewish people, by implication? ) monilically respond to stress with egregiously hostile behaviors (e.g., per the cartoon, armed threat, blackmail, inflammatory name-calling).
One wonders by what review process a cartoon that so distorts history, misrepresents current discourse and strikes chords of prejudice was published in the *Kanan* (let alone on a page where it cannot be dissociated from editorial opinion). The cartoon can serve as both a reminder of our proclivities to cause needless pain to others, and as evidence that we have continuing work to do in creating a more humane university.
Geoffrey Steere Associate professor, American Studies
Labels for groups not prejudiced
I am writing in response to last Friday's letter to the editor criticizing the Kansan for using biased labels. This time, the Kansan's use of terms was correct. Anyone who knows any English is likely to find there is a style book listing proper and politically correct terms. The term pro-choice is correct in that it sums up
our objective perfectly. The pro-choice movement is fighting to keep all options open to women so that they may maintain their constitutional rights. All of us are pro-choice, some are pro-abortion, but none are anti-life. If a pro-lifer feels that the label anti-b abortion holds negative connotations, then perhaps she should review her support of this move. The pro-abortion movement is exactly that, a movement to stop legal abortions. So, if she can't take the heat, then I suggest that she get out of the kitchen.
As a strong believer in the pro-
choice movement, I can only hope that people will stop trying to place negative labels on a movement which is simply fighting for the freedom to choose.
Sybil Hosek
Thousand Oaks, Calif., senior
Senate must look carefully at case
Martin Luther King advised us to judge each other not by the color of our skin but by the content of our hearts and advice then and it is good advice now.
I don't believe smacking somebody in and of itself should be sufficient enough cause to remove a student body president. Life and people are too complex to come to such simplistic conclusions.
I do expect the Student Senate, however, to intelligently evaluate all the evidence at hand and come to a fair decision regarding Darren Fulcher's suitability for the office of student body president. Was the battery incident an isolated occurrence or does it demonstrate a trend? Did Darren really falsify a time card to be paid for time not worked, as has been alleged?
I expect the Student Senate to evaluate these issues on their independent merit, without letting their judgment be clouded by racism (or sexism or any other "ism"). And I have to assume they've done just that it will never not to be so, we'll simply have to remove them from our office as well.
Kenda Sessions Lawrence senior
Student unions attempt to monopolize business
As a British exchange student, Frank Williams' article Sept. 12 further raised my doubts about KU students' ideal as far as the Union is concerned.
In Britain, the student union is usually the cheapest place to shop for everything except food. The Union shops at the vast majority of United Kingdom universities undercut the prices of other shops in the town and this is despite our universities being smaller than ones such as KU. So why do I get the impression that merchandise in the Kansas and Burge unions seems, certainly to me, to be the most expensive in the area?
Stephen Hallis Guest columnist
So what is the Union up to? Ripping you off if you ask me. Frank Williams mentioned in his article that the University does not publicize the existence of the Jayhawk Bookstore and even requires special permission for its promotional bus to be driven onto
It must be possible for the Union here to obtain massive discounts from suppliers on tems such as paper. I appreciate that these can never be as large as the discounts Wal-Mart, etc., offer and should be cheaper that it is at present.
I cannot really comment on books as at the present time in the UK it is illegal to undercut the price which a publisher sets, but as far as the Kansas Union is concerned I am not aware that there are U.S. laws on selling discounted T-shirts and other merchandise. I have no such laws existed for the Union when you see the prices charged by retailers in Lawrence.
campus. In other words, your university is trying to create as near a monopoly as possible by blatantly distorting competition in a country which supposedly believes in the free market.
I realize that the unions are likely to reply that they are the legitimate retailer because they give their profits back to students. I would suggest that as these average 6 percent, the Union should instead reduce its prices and allow open competition on campus and see who wins. Is the Union scared of something, possibly with the Jayhawk Bookstore being allowed to advertise freely they could sell a greater volume of merchandise and consequently reduce their profit margins and prices?
If you ask me, with a market of 28,000 students and the discounts the Union could obtain, it is time that someone takes over. It is importantly, why the Jayhawk Bookstore is so restricted in promoting itself.
*Stephen Hallis an exchange student from the University of Stirling in Scotland and is a junior majoring in marketing.
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Last Hurrahs
by Mike Romane
NOT ONLY AM I THE PRESIDENT OF HAIR CLUB FOR MEN... IM ALSO A CLIENT.