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Mondav. December 10, 1990 / University Daily Kansan
ONE WORLD... ONE PUP'S
Lawrence, U.S.A.
Phone in Orders: 749-1397
Corner of 9th & Indiana
Presidents
Continued from p. 3
"One of the estimated 35 persons arrested Wednesday night for curfew violations was David Awbrey, Hutchinson senior and president of the student body. Awbrey spent the night in jail after failing to post $250 bond. Awbrey was arrested with eight other people at 8:26 p.m. at 1239 Oread Ave while police and National Guard were patrolling the area."
Awbrey served as student-body president from 1969 to 1970. He now is the Wichita Eagle's associate editorial editor.
"I tried to stay involved with politics," he said. "There are not a lot of opportunities for former student radicals. After being student body president, I had no political future. My term, 1968-70, was during very controversy years. The Republican party was hardened and I needed to be in the flow of things, taking action. Journalism provided the place where I could be the most honest and have the most opportunities."
opportunity. KU had a reputation as being one of the most politically active campuses in the country, Awbrey said.
"During my term as student-body president I was involved with the anti war protests," Awbrey said. "I was an activist. I was thrown in jail after the Kansas Union burned in April 1970. I disbelieved the 7 p.m. curfew, and they busted me for disturbing the peace. They made an example of me. I spent some of the summer in jail."
Awbrey said that during his term, Senate started the KU Hilltop Development Center, eliminated school credit for ROTC, gave $10,000 to a politically oriented, student run paper "at a time when the UDK was not in session" and brought political figures to campus, such as Abbie Hoffman.
He said Senate also fought to eliminate women's curfews on campus.
"We thought if the guys could be out all night there was no reason why the woman couldn't as well," he said. "We tackled every issue from the war in Vietnam to sexual liberation." Senate meetings would last until 3 or 4 am, because of the debates between senators, he said.
Awbrey said KU used to have a much different atmosphere.
I look back on it as a time for learning and naïve," he said. "We believed in the Bill of Rights and the freedom of speech and found out that the country really didn't believe in these things. I didn't understand before, but now I realize how idealistic we were."
David Dillon served as student body president from 1972 to 1973. After he graduated with a bachelor's degree in accounting and business administration, he married his high-school sweetheart and attended Southern Methodist University law school. He now is the president of Dillons Companies Inc. and oversees 14 divisions in 21 states.
A unique generation
Dillon said his term as student body president was during a difficult time.
"It was close to the height of the anti-war protests in Vietnam," he said. "There were a lot of mixed emotions. I was middle-of-the-road. I wasn't conservative and I wasn't liberal."
"Students were questioning what the country should represent. We tried to find constructive ways to comment what the students were feeling.
"There were a lot of marches at KU. It was a way to express feelings about the times."
Dillon said that while he was president, Senate passed a resolution that sent student senators to Washington, D.C., to meet with congressmen and express the students' views against the Vietnam war.
"There was a strong feeling that we were a generation of students unlike other generations of students," he said. "We wanted to clearly make a difference in the world. It is still a dream."
Dealing with embezzlement
David Adkins served as student body president from 1982 to 1983. After he graduated with a bachelor's degree in political science, he attended the KU School of Law. He worked as a lawyer in Prairie Village.
Adkins married Lisa Ashner Adkins last April in Danton Chapel Lisa was KU student body president from 1983 to 1984.
"We spent a lot of time together," he said. "Our careers paralleled each other in regard to student policy, was a natural sequence of events."
Adkins she be first met Lisa Ashner Adkins after a mutual friend asked her to help hang posters for David's coalition in the scholarship balls. Later, Lisa Ashner Adkins became involved with Senate.
Adkins said Senate was the best educational experience of his undergraduate years.
"But you get so involved," he said. "It's hard to realize that the average student does not care that much about internal government."
Adkins said he and Lisa Ashner Adkins still kept in touch with the people they met while in office.
"David Ambler came to our wedding, and we still talk to some of the Regents," he said. "When we were in Paris, I was surprised. Now they strike me as pretty young."
He said that half of his term was consumed with handling the aftermath of the discovery that the student director of the KU transportation system had embzzled $20,425 from the sale of bus passes.
"It was interesting to see how the University handed the situation," he said. "Senate was given the right to create safeguards so something like that wouldn't occur in the future. I will talk about it on Wheels for awhile. We put stickers on the bus passes and made buying bus passes a part of enrollment."
KU Vietnam Memorial
After Lisa Ashner Adkins graduated with honors in speech and drama, she attended the KU School where she is now a lawyer in Overland Park.
While Lisa Ashner Adkins was student body president, she was cochair of the committee that conceived the campaign for the KU Vietnam War Memorial.
"I was looking for a project that would have some lasting value," she said. "I didn't want to have spent all my time at Senate budgetary hearings or lobbying in the Legislature or administering student monies."
She said working as student-body president was an excellent experience.
"It is applicable to real life," she said.
Mike Schreiner, present student-body president, said that he eventually wanted to attend law school but he was unsuccessful. Future after he graduates this month.
"I'm concentrating on what I do now," he said. "I don't have time to look into the future."
He said he did not think it would be difficult to readjust to life away from Senate.
"I'm used to jumping into the unknown," he said. "Besides, I will enjoy just to be someone in the crowd."
Schreiner said he would advise future student-body presidents to keep themselves focused and not spread themselves too thin.
"Senate needs to be the No. 1 priority because there are so many different demands placed on the student-body president," he said.
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