CAMPUS/AREA UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Monday, April 8, 1996
3A
Minority recruitment a crucial issue
Cesar Millan
Cesar Millan, Kansas City, Mo., senior, Voice coalition candidate for student body president;
"Senate has done a good job working with minorities, but currently they are not very well-represented at the University, and therefore they are not well represented on Senate either. I will do everything I can do to improve minority recruitment, and I will motivate other students to do the same."
Sixteen of Voice's 65 candidates, or 25 percent, are minorities. The University's overall percentage of minority students is 9 percent.
Both coalitions would make it a top priority
By Susanna Löof
Kansan staff writer
Minority recruitment will be an important issue for Student Senate next year, no matter which coalition wins the election.
Both Grey Montgomery, presidential candidate for the Vision coalition, and Cesar Millan, presidential candidate for the Voice coalition, said recruitment of minority students would be a high priority if they won the election.
Montgomery, Junction City senior,
said the low number of minority students at the University of Kansas caused misunderstandings and stereotypes. To increase the number of minority student, he plans to work with the Office of Minority Affairs to improve recruitment and retention.
"I want the multicultural affairs committee and the Office of Minority Affairs to sit down and have a brainstorm session to come up with creative medium to bring minorities to campus," he said.
Such creative measures could include weekend programs, Montgomery said.
Millan, Kansas City, Mo., senior.
said he planned to organize Minority Recruitment Conferences to attract more minority students to the University.
A weekend conference would be held each semester. Funding would come from the Office of Admissions, he said. The conferences would show both the academic and social aspects of the University.
"They want to fit in here at the University," he said. "At the conference, they would see that there are students here who are able to relate to them."
Gloria Flores, associate director for the Office of Minority Affairs, said she appreciated senate's support of the Multicultural Resource Center.
"It's important that senate continues to understand the relevance of issues related to diversity, because KU continues to become an increasingly diverse University," she said.
Grey Montgomery
Grey Montgomery, Junction City senior, Vision coalition candidate for student body president;
"Something that needs to be improved is minority recruitment and retention. The Multicultural Affairs Committee needs to address that more. Currently, in the graduate division, minority recruitment is taken care of by each department. That needs to be changed. It needs to be a bit more centralized."
Gina Thornburg / KANSAN
Daryl Jones, Wichita senior, volunteers his time tutoring after school and helping in the classroom at Central Junior High School, 1400 Massachusetts St. Jones spends Wednesday and Friday afternoons at the school.
- Seven of Vision's 54 candidates, or 13 percent, are minorities. The University's overall percentage of minority students is 9 percent.
Volunteer provides role model
Wichita senior contributes time to junior high
By Scott MacWilliams Kansan staff writer
Daryl Jones wants to make a difference. He spends six hours a week at Central Junior High School doing just that.
Jones, Wichita senior, is a former KU football player whose playing career was cut short by injury.
Now he focuses his energy on completing degrees in sociology and crime and delinquency. Jones plans to work in youth intervention after graduation.
"I have also volunteered with the Topeka Youth Project," Jones said. "I liked the flexibility in working with the kids there, but they are facing cutbacks."
Jones said he liked to volunteer at Central because he felt he could be a positive role model for some of the at-risk students. He hopes to influence students to keep them from getting involved in drugs and gangs.
Jones spends an hour each Wednesday in Kathy VonEnde's class.
VonEnde said several students in her class had behavioral management problems.
"Daryl comes in and talks to the kids, and they calm down," VonEnde said. "I feel he's a good role model, but sometimes I wonder if he feels like he has a chance to be as much of a role model as he would like to be."
Jones also tutors students on a drop-in basis at the school library after school on Wednesdays and Fridays. Carol Pilant, librarian and volunteer coordinator at Central, has seen Jones in action as a tutor.
"One day there were a couple of students here for tutoring, and they were being pretty rowdy." Pilant said. "Daryl started talking about homework as practice for tests. Pretty soon they started listening to him and focusing on their homework."
Pilant said another time there was a student in a math class who was being taken out of class to meet with a speech therapist and, as a result, was failing math. Jones brought the problem to Pilant's attention.
"I went down to the guidance office, and we got his schedule changed so the student had math in a different hour with the same teacher," Pilant said. "If he didn't made that known to me, it might not have been caught in time."
Jones said he wished that more students volunteered some of their time.
"You can always find an hour or two a week, no matter how busy your schedule looks," Jones said. "If every KU student gave a few hours a week, a lot of good could be done in the community."
Jones said that the Center for
"The rewards in volunteering are personal, knowing that you've really helped someone," Jones said. "Some of the kids have a hard time saying thanks to you, but it shows in other ways."
Community Outreach office in the Organizations and Activity Center had a lot of volunteer opportunities for students.
Vision's StudEx ties upset Voice coalition
By Nicole Kennedy Kansan staff writer
Voice coalition candidates for Student Senate are crying foul.
Cesar Millan, Voice coalition candidate for student body president and campaign manager Jason Angilan are upset because Ken Martin, Student Senate Executive Committee chairman, is listed in the Vision coalition's campaign handbook as a member of the coalition's Issues Research and Development team.
According to the handbook, the team completes issues research and provides responses to opponent's views.
Millan and Angilan said they felt that Martin was endorsing the Vision coalition and that he was acting unethically.
As the executive committee chairman, according to Senate rules and regulations, Martin nominated students to the elections commission and the Senate approved his nominations. Martin also handles any complaints filed against members of the elections commission.
"The fact is that Ken Martin is associated with, and is a manager for, the Vision coalition," Angilan said. "It is unethical for any Student Senate executive to use their position to influence elections or support candidates."
However, Kim Cocks, student body
president, and Martin, said it was not a violation of the elections commission code or the Senate rules and regulations for Senate executives to endorse candidates, as long as their endorsements didn't interfere with their duties.
Cocks and Martin both said that they were working hard to keep campaigns out of the Senate office and meetings.
"Ken has absolutely no say over a decision made by the election commission," Cocks said.
Grey Montgomery, Vision coalition candidate for student body president, said there was no room for bias in Martin's nominations to the elections commission because he appointed the commissioners in the fall, before anyone knew who would run for Senate.
Martin said he had invited members of both coalitions to discuss campaign issues with him and that he was just advising Vision candidates.
"As an individual, I was asked my advice on an issue and unfortunately, the other coalition never asked my opinion," Martin said. "I didn't know I was in the manual."
Jamie Johnson, Vision vice presidential candidate said, "We've only met with him once or twice, and the only thing that was mentioned in those meetings were issues and his knowledge of Student Senate and University governance."
Documentary filmmaker takes corporate giants to task in speech
By Scott MacWilliams Kansan staff writer
Documentary filmmaker Michael Moore spoke Friday night at the Lied Center to a crowd of more than 1.500.
Moore spoke for about two hours on everything from militias to the stock market, and he encouraged students to get involved in politics. He conducted a question and answer session after his speech.
"I found his talk very motivating," said D.E. Benson, Topeka junior. "After he talked about politics so much, I was surprised when he said he wouldn't seek political office."
Moore is known for his 1989 documentary movie Roger and Me in which Moore attempted to ask General Motors CEO Roger Smith about the damage done to Flint, Mich., by closing the GM factories there.
Moore spoke against the corporate mentality that places profit above loyalty to employees.
"What the militia groups represent is the American dream going up in smoke," Moore said. "Used to be you worked hard for the company; it prospered, you prospered. Now the company prosperd, and you lose your job."
Moore said that last year Manpower Temporary Services passed GM to become the largest employer in the United States.
"No benefits, no job security
no job security — people are for getting what that me ans , " Moore said.
Michael Moore
"When it was announced that 700,000 new jobs had been created, the stock market took a huge dive." Moore said. "It's bad news when
American workers get jobs? That's sick."
While speaking out against social injustice, Moore made it clear he wasn't a Clinton admirer.
"Clinton came to Flint in 1992 to speak at a union hall, and they asked me to come and do a photo op," Moore said. "What's he doing in a union hall when he's planning to ship all these jobs to Mexico? I refused."
Moore said he saw little difference between the two major parties and that most Americans don't vote because they are disillusioned.
"We should call them the Republic扎牧," Moore said.
Moore said in his closing remarks that he did support the Republican party platform.
"I think crime's the No. 1 problem in the country," Moore said. "We need to round up all the corporate crooks, lock them up and throw away the key. I'm also for getting rid of all the welfare queens in the country."
Moore named as the biggest welfare queens Lockheed, Martin Marietta, Ford, General Electric and GM.
Moore explained that while there are 20,000 handgun murders each year, 60,000 people lose their lives on the job each year.
"I would like to see this shift so that we saw white collar crime as just as evil at street crimes," Moore said.
Moore said the Republicans had it all wrong on the right to life movement.
"Life doesn't begin at the moment of conception, it starts with the sperm," he said. "We must go after the senseless slaughter of millions of sperm every day! Like the fraternities! Let's go get Beta Theta Pii!"
Moore is working on a book to be published by Random House this year.
"It's going to be called Downsize This," Moore said.