OPINION
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
PUBLISHED DAILY SINCE 1912
4
CRAIG LANG, Editor Mark OZIMEK, Business manager
SUSANNA LOOP, Managing editor DENNIS HAUPT, Retail sales manager
KIMBERLY CRABTREE, Editorial editor JUSTIN KNUPP, Technology coordinator
TOM EBLEN, General manager, news adviser JAY STEINER, Sales and marketing adviser
Tuesday, February 25, 1997
Jeff MacNelly / CHICAGO TRIBUNE
Requiring documented excuses doesn't help attendance problem
Editorials
Requiring documented excuses puts an unnecessary burden on students and health professionals. Just because you're too sick to attend class doesn't necessarily mean you need to see a doctor. If you have a cold or the flu, the doctor can't do much more than time can. And going to Watkins Memorial Health Center strictly to get a doctor's note only burdens Watkins' staff with patients that don't need treatment.
If you want to throw away your education that's your right, isn't it? So why must some instructors require a documented excuse for missing a class and lower your grade if you don't have one?
Also, we are adults. If we feel we're too sick to attend classes or that we have some other compelling reason to miss, that is our decision. This is a university, not a daycare center. If we wish to punish ourselves by missing a lecture, we must accept the consequences
dents to attend classes, maybe they need to question their teaching techniques. Are the lectures interesting enough to keep students in class? Are they informative enough to convince students that they are missing valuable information? Are the tests written so that a student who has missed numerous classes will be at a significant disadvantage? If students know that attendance is significantly advantageous, they will be there.
Students are adults, and we have the right to miss class if we wish.
when it is exam time.
Besides that, we pay a lot of money for our education. During a 15-week semester, in-state undergraduate students pay about $4.20 an hour for classroom instruction each day. Non-residents pay $17.67 for each hour of class instruction. If you skip all three of your classes one day and you're an out-of-state undergraduate, you just wasted about $53. If students are spending that kind of money each day, they should be attending lectures because they're a worthwhile investment and because they want and need to attend them, not because their grades are in jeopardy.
If teachers feel they need to force stu
Requiring documented excuses is appropriate for late papers and missed exams, because even the most responsible adult would be tempted to enjoy an extra day of studying before an exam. It also makes sense in classes based on participation. However, for normal class periods, requiring documented excuses is insulting to students and a poor substitute for the kind of teaching that makes students want to come to class.
KAREN CHANDLER FOR THE EDITORIAL BOARD
Smoking laws must value all rights
This is a free country. People older than 18 have the right to a cigarette and a lighter and to pursue the perfect place to smoke. However, if these include public places accessible to minors, then a recent proposal by Kansas legislator Ted Powers to prohibit smoking from these locations may cause smokers to feel as constricted as their lungs are when they inhale cigarette smoke. Powers' proposal seeks to protect minors from second-hand smoke by outlawing smoking in many places smokers frequent. This is a good idea except in public areas, such as restaurants and coffee shops, in which second-hand smoke may be controlled.
However, with the vacillations people have in supporting more government expansion, they will not support the government acting as surrogate parents who tell their children what is and is not a healthy environment. But federal law states that children cannot buy and
In businesses where areas can't be partitioned, smoking should be banned.
smoke cigarettes until they turn 18. Doesn't this law directly imply that children should not expose their lungs to cigarette smoke before the age of 18? If so, then why is Powers' proposal, which is designed to protect children from second-hand smoke, any different?
In places accessible to minors that cannot directly partition off smoking sections, such as concert halls, smoking should be banned. Some smokers may argue that it is their right to smoke wherever they choose, but does this right supersede the rights of non-smokers to breath smoke-free air?
second-hand smoke may kill about 3,000 people as a result of lung cancer. So the question becomes, should the rights of smokers put others at a health risk?
In 1993, an Environmental Protection Agency report based on 30 epidemiologic studies worldwide concluded that
For some businesses, like restaurants and coffee houses, government regulations should be limited. Restaurant and coffee house owners should not be told whom they can and cannot admit into their businesses. But more rigid health standards should be enforced. For example, smoking sections should be sequestered away from non-smoking sections by placing smoking sections in separate rooms that are well ventilated. This way, second-hand smoke cannot pollute the entire building.
In California, smoking is prohibited in all public places, including bars. Although some may view this as extreme, it suggests that smokers have the right to smoke only when that right does not interfere with the health and comfort of others.
NICK ZALLER FOR THE EDITORIAL BOARD
KANSAN STAFF
LATINA SULLYAN . Associate Editorial
KRISTIE BLASI . News
NOVELDA SOMMERS . News
LESLIE TAYLOR . News
AMANDA TRAUGHBER . News
TARA TRENARY . News
DAVID TESKA . Online
SPENCER DUNCAN . Sports
GINA THORNBURG . Associate Sports
BRADLEY BROOKS . Campus
LINDSEY HENRY . Campus
DAVE BRETTENSTEIN . Features
PAM DISIMAN . Photo
TYLER WIRKEN . Photo
BRYAN VOLK. Design
ANDY ROHRBACK . Graphics
ANDREA ALBIGHT . Wire
LIZ MUSSER . Special sections
AERICA VAZEY . News clerk
NEWS EDITORS
ADVERTISING MANAGERS
ADVERTISING MANAGERS
HEATHER VALLER .Assistant retail
JULIE PEDLAR .Campus
DANA CENTENO .Regional
ANNETTE HOOVER .National
BRIAN PAGEL .Marketing
SARAH SCHERWINSKI .Internet
DARCI MCLAIN .Production
DENA PISCOTTE .Production
ALLISON PIERCE .Special sections
SARA ROSE .Creative
DANA LAUVETZ .Public relations
BRIAN LEFEVRE .Classified
RACHEL RUBIN .Assistant classified
BRIDGET COLLYER .Zone
JULIE DEWITT .Zone
CHRIS HAGHIRIAN .Zone
LZ HESS .Zone
ANTONY MIGLIAZZO .Zone
MARIA CRUST .Senior account executive
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all letter and guest columns should be submitted to the Kansan newsroom, 111 Stauffer-Flint Hall. The Kansan reserves the right to edit, cut to length or reject all submissions. For any questions, call Kimberly Crabtree (opinion@kansan.com) or LaTina Sullivan (sullivan@kansan.com) at 864-4810.
Upon entering this university seven years ago, I was presented with a key to my residence hall room, an identification card with a photo I still swear is not me, instructions to find myself and a barrage of pre-approved credit card applications
Taking charge of your credit cards isn't easy
Column
These dreadful applications can be found in the shopping bags that our newly purchased books are placed in each semester, on the walls of the buildings we stroll through and in our mailboxes. As an innocent and naive 17 year old, I was astounded and amused that so many companies were willing to extend credit to me. Although I had worked since the age of 13, I had saved silch for all of my
At the very least, I would have refrained from making so many frivolous purchases. I am quite certain I could have survived without investing in all of the clothes, the Captain and Tennille cassettes, the rounds of libations at Benchwarmers and the Hawk, the myriad "KU supports Desert Storm" T-shirts and all of the other junk I have since discarded or burned.
I do not regret the investment in my future. I simply lame the way I did it. Had I known then that my credit card balance would quickly double, triple and do back flips thanks to the brilliance of finance charges, perhaps I would have investigated other ways I could have paid for my education.
As an on-again, off-again student for the last few years, I have simply looked at my credit card and financial aid debt as something to deal with when I earn my degree. With that day fast approaching, I am developing an intense fear of graduating. With my credit rating in its current laughable and lamentable pit of despair, my intentions of buying a house in the near future seem farcical.
toil and trouble. I did not own a home, a car or even a goldfish, so I wondered what made these schmucks assume I could repay them for my purchases.
I would say it is disgusting to see companies blatantly prey upon unworthy college kids who may not realize the potential perils of purchasing on credit. However, it would be unfair to place all of the blame on Visa and Mastercard. I am the one that had to buy Herman's Hermits Greatest Hits and the Partridge Family's Top Hits. I am the one that had to send a small fortune to Victoria's Secret. And I am the one that had to own the sweatshirt with Vinnie Barbarino, Arnold Horshack and the rest of the Sweathogs.
cases. Therein lies the deceitful and reprehensible strategy these credit companies rely upon. They knew I would not be able to immediately pay off my cards because I was simply another broke college student surviving on a pittance from my parents, financial aid and a job. Therefore, astronomical finance charges would ensue, compounded daily, hourly, almost every second, multiplying the debt and pushing me further into a purchasing purgatory.
In my defense, a significant portion of my debt is due to paying for a few particularly difficult semesters' tuition, books and groceries purely on credit. It is rather disconcerting to realize I am still paying off the books that I did not read one semester six years ago. At the time I made these grandiose investments in my education, I assumed my redemption would be forthcoming in the form of a diploma. Little did I know it
shake my head and it is true.
That said, I am also the one who can now view my tremendous debt as something to deal with after I earn my master's degree.
would be several years and a few gray hairs before my wager would pay off.
Sabrina Steele is an Overland Park senior in political science.
Guest column
Town hall meeting helps tackle advising system
The advising system at the University of Kansas has been a joke for some time.
Although many criticisms and suggestions are voiced among students, they are never heard by those who can make a difference. Never
the mere mention of campus advising conjures up memories of unproductive chat sessions between a naive undergraduate and a professor better suited for research than advice on how to cram humanities requirements into a schedule.
can make a difference. Fear. Critics of the advising system will get to voice their concerns to KU's decision makers at Student Senate's latest installment of town hall meetings.
Town hall meetings have confused me since I started attending them earlier this year. The last one, for example, concerned parking and campus lighting. Held at a convenient on-campus location and open to the public, I was sure this meeting would attract dozens of concerned students who were relieved that their case would finally be heard. Throw in the fact that the panel contained director of parking Don Kearns, two parking board members and student body president Grey Montgomery, and I thought I would be part of a standing-room-only crowd. Such a controversial issue should draw attention, right?
Wrong.
About 25 people attended the meeting, most of whom were student senators or communications board members. The students who attended complained of several dimly lit campus areas as well as scholarship hall parking troubles related to
Wrong.
In the meantime, think about our advising system and the troubles with it. I hope to see you tonight.
weekend bar patrons. These issues were noted by the panelists, and action was promised. Amazingly enough, all of the problems mentioned were looked at within a few weeks — lighting was provided for the areas discussed during the meeting and a continuous towing program was started on Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights for nonpermit holders in scholarship hall parking lots.
events. The next town hall meeting will be at 7 tonight at Gertrude Sellards Pearson Hall. Major changes are in store for advising but members of the Committee for the Improvement of Advising Services for Freshman and Sophomores want your opinion on what is right and wrong with the current system before they take action. If you have any questions regarding the meeting, contact Communications Board chair Kevin Lafferty at senate@falcon.co.uk.ans.edu
Many people seem to think that town hall meetings are worthless affairs consisting of panelists who make promises that will never be fulfilled. In actuality, nothing could be further from the truth. Town hall meetings are put on by the Student Senate Communications Board, a group that promotes student activities and facilitates interaction between Student Senate and the student body. The communications board organizes the meetings to provide an open forum about controversial topics on the Hill, and it gives students a chance to have their questions answered and give their opinions on what should be done. The meetings also give those in charge a chance to present their views on current situations and future events.
David Reynoldson is a Junction City Junior in business and accounting.
Letter
A short walk on a sunny day was not the only protest against the SLT that KU Environs has been involved in. For the last three months, we have protested every Sunday at noon at 31st and Louisiana streets, including all of the subzero-degree Sundays. Come and join us sometime.
Here is some information for Chris Galloway, who so courageously shared his views on the South Lawrence Trafficway.
Galloway's views on SLT show lack of information
Protesting is far from the only action KU Environs takes against the traffcway. We are one of many plaintiffs in a pending lawsuit against the county. We speak to city and county commissioners and meet with concerned citizens of Haskell.
The wetlands are sacred to all of us as creatures on this farmland planet. The wetlands are breeding centers for many species
and are crucial to the lives of all plants and animals in the area, including humans. They are also natural water purification and drainage systems, and they are invaluable resources for ecological research and discovery. They are not empty, open pastures.
It will also destroy a sacred place of prayer for Native Americans. Who are you to judge the
please continue.
Yes, inanimate objects such as four-lane highways can and do destroy wetlands. This isn't just a road. It's all of the businesses that will be built along this road. It's all of the pollution from all of the vehicles that will be driven on this road. It's all of the vegetation that will be removed, resulting in surface runoff, erosion, flooding, animal extinction, an increase in carbon dioxide and a decrease in oxygen contributing to the greenhouse effect, which takes away from your air supply. Yes, this inanimate object will eventually ruin the wetlands.
cultural and religious value of Haskell's property Perhaps you were not aware, but all of this land we stand upon belongs to Native Americans. Is one plot of land, which is lawfully theirs anyway, too much to ask?
This may not seem like an important issue, but this case is setting a precedent for all environmental justice in the nation. Both President Clinton and the Environmental Protection Agency have examined this case. They have recognized its impact on the rights of Native Americans everywhere, as well as on the environmental health of the entire great plains area.
Finally, protests do change the world. Every kind and just action has a positive influence. Gandhi once said, "However insignificant what you do may seem, it's more important that you do it." We can and do make a difference every day of our lives.
Natalie R. Sullivan Kansas City, Mo., junior