KU
kansan
A student newspaper serving KU
78th Year, No.121
LAWRENCE, KANSAS
Friday, April 26, 1968
SORORITY GIRL PUT ON PEDESTAL
Blossom Phelps, Overland Park senior, poses in classical dress behind the Student Union while performing her service project for Greek Week. Asked if sorority membership restricts acquaintances, Miss Phelps replied, "Oh, no! Both of my friends who don't live in houses are independents."
Salsish: fired or not?
Hamilton J. Salsich, assistant instructor of English at KU for two years, said Thursday he probably would not be asked to return for the fall semester.
Salsich, who has been the center of a controversy regarding grading and classroom teaching procedure in the English Department, said a departmental representative informed him of the possibility about one month ago
James A. Gowen, acting assistant professor of English and temporary director of the freshmansophomore English program, challenged Salsich's statement and said his future at KU would be decided by the Assistant Instructor Committee during a meeting in late May.
Gowen said Salsich was given a form on which he indicated whether he would want to continue as an assistant instructor of English at KU as were all of the members of the department.
A third-year graduate student from St. Louis, Mo., Salsich is working toward a Ph.D. in English and has indicated that he plans to be at the University at least one more year.
Salsich said he has found it exceedingly difficult to teach students in the atmosphere that "destroys a student's innate desire to learn." He termed KU as having that atmosphere because the system forces students to cheat in some instances.
It was with this attitude that Salsich sought to improve his classes by deviating somewhat from the traditional procedure
"I do not want to place students in this type of destructive atmosphere and expect them to call what they are getting an education," he said.
Fling parade led by ducks
Ducks, duck-people and the Gaslight Gang highlighted the Spring Fling parade down Jayhawk. Boulevard this morning
The parade contained 12 floats from the residence and scholarship halls, the four Spring Fling queen candidates and the KU Jayhawk as well as the ducks and girls dressed in duck costumes.
observed in the KU English class- rooms.
"It was not the draft that started my objections to the grading system," he said. "But the expansion of the war and the draft pressure have distorted the spectrum."
"I probably would, if approached by one of my male students, give him whatever grade necessary for him to escape the draft," Salsich said.
"The point is clear to me," Gowen said in a later interview, "Salsich's grading is not a violation of departmental policy, but rather a departure from University policy established by the Faculty Senate."
"Students are competing for grades, not knowledge," Salsich said. "You cannot really expect students to learn this way.
"I feasibly could kill a male student by giving him a low grade that would make him draft material." he said. "I cannot do it—it's immoral."
The controversy reached a high point when Salsich and William Bass, professor of anthropology, discussed cheating and immortality in the classroom at the University.
During the discussion, it was pointed out that Salsich was using a different system of grading and a modified classroom procedure. He said many of the traditional
concepts and formalisms of the classroom had been tossed away
He initiated both the grading and classroom practices at the beginning of the spring semester in February. Salsich did not inform Gowen of the procedural changes immediately.
But after an account of the dialogue with Bass was published in a local newspaper, several University administrators and faculty members were concerned with the practices and "much pressure was applied on certain departmental personnel, including me."
Gowen called a special conference in which he informed Salsich a compromise on the classroom procedure, especially grading, must be reached.
"I agreed, but refused to relinquish one basic position—whatever grade a male student needed to avoid the draft he would get by counseling with me first," he said.
Gowen said he felt that some of Salsich's suggestions and reforms were worth "consideration."
"There are no indications, I can see, that his decisions to change have been wrong," Gowen commented.
Gowen said he would certainly like to see Salsich stay at the University, because he "has been a good influence and has offered many stimulating comments regarding policy."
New abortion laws?
TOPEKA-Liberalizing of the state's abortion laws was recommended Thursday by the Kansas Judicial Council as part of the first proposed comprehensive revision of the state's criminal code in more than a century.
The recommended abortion law, patterned after recently enacted legislation in Colorado and North Carolina, would permit abortion when:
- There is substantial risk that a continuance of a pregnancy would gravely impair the physical or mental health of the mother.
- The child would be born with grave physical and mental defect.
- The pregnancy resulted from rape, incest or other felonious intercourse.
The proposed code would dispense with adherence to the rule that fixes criminal responsibility when the accused knows the nature of act and knows the act is wrong.
It also gives the court broader discretion to vary minimum penalties in accordance with circumstances.
The council and the Advisory Committee on Criminal Law Revision, which made the study, did not make any recommendation on the state's death penalty.
The council proposal also recommends a more simple classification of crimes for the purpose of fixing penalties and assigning crimes of like gravity to the same class and uniform penalty to all crimes of the same class.
Day camp fund drive starts Monday
By Joanna Wiebe
Kansan Staff Reporter
A white hand interlocks with a black hand every time a student contributes money to the Lawrence Day Camp fund. A small card with this symbol is given to the contributor, and the KU Student Committee for the Lawrence Day Camp program is another step closer to reaching its $15,000 goal.
The student drive officially begins Monday, although a small number of contributions have already trickled in.
A faculty drive, which is aiming at $7,500, is attempting to personally contact every KU staff member, and a two-week old downtown campaign has received $32,-000 to date.
"There is still the possibility of several large contributions coming in from the community," said Bill Simons, director of the Ballard Center, one of the sponsors of the Dav Camp.
$46,340 is needed for the operation of the 10-week, all-day Lawrence Day Camp for boys and girls this summer, which projects
an enrollment of 200 children, five through 16 years of age. In the approaching long, hot summer of '68, the day camp will provide "constructive recreational and learning experiences for children and jobs for employable young people 16 years of age and up," says a Day Camp Prospectus."
Worried citizens across the nation are chewing their finger nails to the armpits, and law enforcement officials are readying themselves in anticipation of massive racial unrest and riots in the streets of American cities. Lawrence, which has a sizeable population of low-income Negro families, is as potentially explosive as any other similar American town, informed individuals have said.
Possible destruction and loss of life can be averted by positive action, such as the day camp program.
Activities being considered for the day camp include the writing and producing of a weekly camp paper, the creation and production of plays, projects in art, music and science, and the election
of a council of representatives for the Day Camp to give the children experience in "government."
Professional volunteer consultants are being solicited from the University faculty and advanced graduate students to help plan programs to aid the children in growing academically. "While summer is a 'fun time,' it is also a learning time," say the planning notes.
Employment opportunities for youth would include such jobs as junior and senior aides, counselor and health aide, which would earn from $10 to $75 a week. Many of the 73 job slots will help young people who have a hard time finding summer employment, many of whom would be college bound or in college but from low-income family backgrounds. Others will be high school students who must work so they can return to school in the fall.
The prospectus proposes that at least 60 of the 73 proposed job slots could be filled by persons from low-income families. It is
hoped that some of these jobs may be outside the day-camp program, with such community employers as Hallmark, Stokely, or KU.
When a group of graduate students were addressed in their psychology class in late February by Simons of the Ballard Center, who spoke of the problems in organizing Day Camp, they responded "spontaneously and enthusiastically," said Mrs. Frances Horowitz, chairman of the department of Human Development, and head of the advisory committee to plan the Day Camp
Their eagerness to help was "stalled" in order to insure a commitment from the community, said Mrs. Horowitz last Tuesday. "We didn't want to make this project solely 'on-the-hill,'" she said. Mrs. Horowitz is working with the student fund-raising program.
"We asked what we could do to help them, but they told us to go fly a kite. We believed them, and flew our kites," said Mehmet Gurkaynak, Biga, Turkey, graduate student.
By this time, the community drive was in full gear, and the offer of help was accepted. Progress in organizing the drive is "good" said Mike Warner, Lawrence graduate student and chairman of the student fund-raising group.
Posters and information sheets are being distributed this weekend, solicitors have volunteered in most living groups, and the drive will be broadcast across the campus through the Information Booth loudspeaker on Jayhawk Blvd.
"We're trying to communicate to every student about this thing," said Gurkaynak. "Those who know what the camp is all about are responding beautifully. Those who don't know, shrink away."
"I hope students will realize their community responsibility and take action," said Dorn Barlow, Haven graduate student, Thursday evening. She said her industrial psychology class has pledged to give $70.
"The professors have been very cooperative with the drive, and
See Camp page 16