4A Thursday, February 29, 1996 OPINION UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN VIEWPOINT High Math 002 enrollment shows need for standards Any incoming freshman at the University of Kansas who does not have sufficient math skills to take MATH 101, College Algebra, can enroll in the Intermediate Algebra Course, MATH 002. Last semester 1,308 KU students had to take MATH 002 because they were not prepared for a college-level math course. This shows the necessity for a policy of qualified admissions at the Regents schools. Because too many freshmen come to college without having taken enough mathematics, the University must teach high school-level classes. In addition to being an embarrassment for an institution of higher education, such a situation results in a waste of money. Indeed, funds that could be used more effectively are being wasted to teach unprepared students. This does not mean that classes such as MATH 002 should be eliminated. Some students who are going back to school after long interruptions in their educations THE ISSUE: Remedial education The University should not have to supply many high school level classes to unprepared students. might need to refresh their math skills. Nevertheless, the majority of people taking MATH 002 today are freshmen. This situation should not be tolerated. The lowest math class that incoming freshmen could take should be College Algebra, MATH 101. Even if a qualified admissions policy wouldn't be enacted until 2001, the University needs to have higher standards for its students. After all, the lowest level of English freshmen can take is English 101. The department of English does not offer high school-level English grammar classes. Similarly, the department of mathematics should not offer high school-level classes. HENRI BLANC FOR THE EDITORIAL BOARD Speaker defines racism problem; listeners should work on solution The University of Kansas recently was graced with the wit, wisdom and prudence of self-proclaimed racist and lecturer Jane Elliot. According to Elliot, if you are white and raised and schooled in the United States, then you are a racist. Unfortunately, Elliot is correct. Whether or not we wish to admit it and whether or not we wish to change it, white America breeds and condones a social system that harbors division based on skin color. Elliot gave a two-and-a-half-hour lecture Sunday afternoon in which she berated the white male and harangued the credulous white females who, unbeknownst to them, are horrible, unfeeing bigots who cannot comprehend what it feels like to be discriminated against. Elliot feels strongly about her position and used every means possible to make her point. Elliot's message was important. Elliot's medium was poor. Elliot uses harsh, demeaning, sexist humor and ethically questionable tactics to get her point across. Apparently she believes that people who THE ISSUE: Racism speaker aren't of color are incapable of understanding something without being beaten into submission. Elliot convincingly made her point in five minutes and spent most of the remaining time reiterating it and smothering the audience with guilt. She spent no time suggesting real solutions. She has spent a great portion of her life identifying racism but apparently little time trying to fix it. She admits the innate flaw in herself and claims that she slips "Freudianly" into racist slurs frequently. Racism is a tremendous problem today. If people could treat each other as people and not as one of scores of racially divided subcategories, we all would be better off. The University is fortunate to have had the opportunity to listen to Elliot. However, we must do more than listen. The students who listened to her message now can begin to work on a solution to her problem and our problem: racism. CHRIS VINE FOR THE EDITORIAL BOARD Jeff MacNelly / CHICAGO TRIBUNE Leaving the nest for college can brings siblings together When I left sunny California for undergrad many moons ago, I left home for good. I packed several pair of underwear, my Oingo Boingo tapes, and a dictionary into a 510 Datsun — That's what Nissan used to be called in the old days — and headed across country for some serious book learnin'. Wagons Ho, dude! I set off on the open road with just enough Nietzsche, Hesse and Pirsig in my brain to make me dangerous. Life, the great adventure! lay resting out there for me like some sleeping bear just waiting for me to poke it with a stick and provoke it. Blah, Blah, get the hell out of here and let us fight over your room. And then mom and dad share a cup of coffee in the kitchen, pretend to be sad, and both think quietly to themselves, "Whew, only two more to go and we can have the place to ourselves." Meanwhile, back at the home steed, I left behind my mom, dad, brother and sister. When big brother goes off to college, it typically goes something like this: "See ya. Stay out of trouble. Call us. Don't party too much. Study hard. We can't wait to see you at Christmas." When I left home, I had very little on my mind other than figuring out how to study as little as possible without getting shipped back to California. Since those wacky, carefree days, the folds did the inverse Grapes of Wrath thing back to Kansas, and my sister, Jennifer, wandered back here too a few years later to finish school. Be patient. I'm getting to the point — STAFF COLUMNIST just think of this column as a dance-mix version. So, go figure, "home" came to me. I thought, "Great, this is what happens when you try to leave the nest. They figure out where you'll fly next and settle there." But, the funny thing is that I don't really mind. See, when I left home, my sister, Jenny, still wore braces and said things such as "Like, I totally don't you. Ohmigod, you are so brother-like with that repressive behavior. You are going to be absolutely way deep in, like, parental attention when they get home. Later. I'm going to my room." When I caught up with Jennifer in Kansas about ten years later, she wore Doc Martens and said things such as "My new medium is silk, but I'll still work with some of the synthetics sometimes. I like the texture and mood of the natural fibers. You know, I made my live-in boyfriend a pair of boxers out of this same material. So, what are you doing about birth control these days? Oh, big brother, are you still living in a cave and thinking that we w-o-m-y-n are responsible for all that?" Whoa. What happened to my little sister? Nothing, except that she grew up, turned into a woman, and rocked my big-brother world. I think I'm lucky. Several years ago, I left behind a teenager that I didn't know and years later I discovered a young woman who made me understand her on her own terms. If we had lived near each other for all those years, we may have never gotten over the familial baggage of being a big brother and little sister. How many "grown-ups" live well into their 40s, 50s and 60s, without ever giving up those sibling relationships? Tune in to any Thanksgiving dinner with the extended family, any extended family, and watch all the brothers and sisters play out their petty, hierarchical roles. Children will be children will be children, no matter how old they get. But, not my sister and me. Because we didn't bear the burden of growing older in the same place, life allowed us the opportunity to get to know each other again as adults. I met an older Jennifer, a grown woman with ideas and experiences not unlike her brother. We grumble together about politics, share books with each other and laugh over beers about this crazy place called Kansas. We talk about people in our lives. After time, I developed a friendship with my "little sister." Of course, I can't remember how long it has been since I thought of her as my "little sister." These days, I just think of her as my friend, my friend who also happens to be my sister. Lucky me. John Martin is a Lawrence second-year law student LETTERS TO THE EDITOR Qualified admissions limits opportunities According to the editorial issued on Feb.21, the enrollment figures express need for admission standards. In my view, this is wrong. There are fewer freshman than last semester. So what? The University of Kansas lost more freshman than its peer institutions. So what? If a large school sets a high requirement such as a 3.0 grade point average or high ACT scores, some high school students who have a professional potential but are not good at other subjects could not learn more in a well-funded university with excellent teachers. In Taiwan, many successful people regret that they didn't enter a college or university because they were not good at some subjects that they hated or were not "test-taking machines." Every high school graduate should have the opportunity to further his education at universities and colleges, even at top-notch, large universities. However, I found a school that offered every high school graduate a good chance to experience a large university's life. That's the University of Kansas. After a semesters experience here, students will perceive what they want to and what they don't. They will know their ability for studying in a university. Then they can make a choice for leaving or staying at a university. The University still maintains its high and strict academic quality in spite of the freshman's decision. Wu Peih-Shyun Taiwan graduate student We set out on a clear and cold January morning. Our canoe, packed with a week's worth of supplies, slid into the frigid waters of the Kaw River with barely a ripple. My friend Terry Grant, a senior at Haskell University, looked up at me and smiled. Eagle watching on Kaw dredges up filthy memories "Nice day for eagle watching," he said. And it was. The sky was a pale blue. Bird songs beckoned, and the river spread before us with the promise of true a documentary. true adventure. Our journey had begun. We paddled nearly half a day before we spotted our first eagle. Standing high above on the bare branches of a cottonwood, it watched us curiously with what appeared to be a look of resentment. Then it slipped from its perch and soared around the bend, leaving us staring there long after it was gone. We paddled on in silence. We would see many more of these beautiful, sacred birds before the week was done. Our picture-taking frenzy quickly would give way to the contentment of observation as we savored their grace in flight and their quiet intensity. The trip would have been perfect, if not for the garbage. Trash littered the riverside, strewn around nearly every bend. And it wasn't just the occasional beer can or clumsy campfire. Great piles of trash cascaded down the river banks and floated in the water: rusted car bodies, bedsprings, shopping carts, tires, televisions, plastic wrappers and Styrofoam cups. Innumerable bags of garbage were broken open and spilled their contents like blood across once pristine and unsullied land. It was a grotesque monument to a people bent on exploiting the land and content to consume and discard whatever their momentary desires demanded. The water itself reeked of this abuse. Slicks of rainbow-colored mud spread out in the aftermath of every riverside community. Metal tubes carried the run-off from farms and families, dumping their contents into a river already abused and polluted beyond its capacity. And crem-colored foam gathered on the bank at every twist and turn. I have yet to identify any of the sludge we saw, but I can assure you it was unfit to drink and poison to the river itself. As a matter of fact, the entire Kaw River is unfit to drink. It is among the top 10 most polluted rivers in the United States. As a warning to you to plan more carefully than we did, we ran out of water on our fifth day and were forced to boil water for cooking and drinking. We should have boiled it longer. I felt its effects for a week after our return and came to know the parasite giardia on an intimate level. I also spent a lot of time in the bathroom, praying for respite from the consequences of my folly and thinking of the conditions that brought me there in the first place. We have ruined the Kaw River. The fish in it are unsafe to eat in any quantity. It is not safe to drink Swimming is highly discouraged. Yet we continue to exploit it beyond its capacity. We dredge it, we dump sewage into it, we feed the run-off from farms and factories into it, and all with a blind eye to the cesspool it has become. When Terry's wife, Darci, picked us up, she made us roll the windows down for the entire drive back to Manhattan, Kan. After seven days out, it only took a two-hour bath and a week on the throne to rid me of the fifth acquired without and within. I fear I will be dead before the river is ever clean again. Todd Hitt is a Lyndon senior in social welfare KANSAN STAFF ASHLEY MILLER Editor VIRGINIA MARGHEIM Managing editor ROBERT ALLEN News editor TOM EBLEN General manager, news adviser Editors Campus Joann Birk Philip Brownlee Editorial Paul Todd Associate editorial Craig Lang Course Matt Wood Sports Yosh Brinker Associate sports Bill Petula Photo Andy Rullestad Matt Flickner Graphics Noah Musser Special sections Novoida Bommers Wire Tara Trenary Illustration Micah Leaker HUBIE By Greg Hardin