CAMPUS/AREA UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Thursday, November 16, 1995
3A
Steve Puppe / KANSAN
Merritt Palm speaks to the KU Sailing Club about her experiences on the America's Cup 28-member team. Palm was one of 700 women who tried out for the team. Palm was a sail trimmer, or boat steerer, for the team.
Would-be sailing champion visits KU
By Brenden Sager Kansan staff writer
Merritt Palm told a tale of 28 women, one man and a stale wind that cost them all a world championship.
Palm was the trimmer aboard the Mighty Mary with the America$^a$ sailing team during the America's Cup races in April. The sail trimmer steers the boat's front sail to control the speed.
Palm was invited by the KU Sailing Club to speak. She talked about her experience on the
nearly winning team and what it was like to be a female sailor in a male-dominated sport.
Palm said that during the race the Might Mary had a four minute lead ahead of Stars & Stripes—a vessel filled with men stem to stern — until the wind that was guiding America<sup>3</sup> to victory suddenly disappeared.
The men won by 52 seconds.
The 1995 race, however, was the first time a female-dominated racing team had been in the America's Cup - let alone almost winning it. The team would have been
all women but Dave Dellenbaugh was chosen to be tactician, the sailor who navigates the boat, during the plavoffs leading to the race.
Palmhas been travelling across the country visiting different high schools to talk about her experiences with America $ ^{3} $ Palm came to the University as part of a special visit that the KU Sailing Club lobbied for, said Brian Dick, Englewood, Colo., sophomore and commodore of the club.
Palm said part of her sailing experience was trying to show men that women were seaworthy.
"Boats are shes," she said. "Of course women are supposed to be on them."
Palm founded her high school sailing team, sailed in college and eventually was chosen as one of 28 women to be on the America $^3$ team. Seven hundred women tried out from across the nation.
The high number of female tryouts for the team was unusual because it has been a male-dominated sport historically.
"I think there's a lot of guys out there that still don't get it," she said.
IS BREAKFAST DEAD?
Mom was right: Breakfast is a good idea, even for college students
Eating sensibly all day long is prompted by morning meals
By Craig Lang
Kansan staff writer
For David Stroehmann, a typical breakfast is a noon beer.
Because he usually does not have to wake up early in the morning, Stroehmann, Overland Park junior, said he usually skipped breakfast and waited until lunchtime to eat.
He said on the occasions that he did have to wake up early, he usually did not wake up until it was time to go, so he was in too much in a hurry to have breakfast.
"I'll be hungry — I just won't have time to eat." he said.
For many college students, making time for a good breakfast is almost impossible. While most students rely on a bowl of cereal to carry them through the morning, others do not eat anything at all.
Moran said people who ate breakfast regulated their food intake better throughout the day. She said people were more likely to have sensible lunches and dinners and were less likely to continually snack between meals.
Chris Moran, registered dietitian at the University of Kansas Medical Center, said studies had proven that eating a good breakfast appeared to be associated with people having a better attitude at work or school.
"If you skip breakfast, you'll be hungry at lunch." Moran said. "That will lead you to eat
more high-calorie foods, which can lead to overeating."
David Parks, Wichita sophomore, said he performed better on days he didn't eat breakfast than on days when he woke up early to make something to eat.
"On the days I eat heavy, I'm just kind of lazy in class," he said.
Parks said when he didn't eat breakfast, his motivation for the day was that he would get to eat when he got home from school.
Igor Kantor, Leawood freshman, said he had a hard time functioning on the mornings he did not have time to make breakfast. He said he got so hungry during class that he could not concentrate on taking notes.
"If I don't eat, I just can't wait to get out and grab a bite to eat." he said.
Moran said not eating breakfast could make a student miss out on certain nutrients essential to getting through the day, including protein, carbohydrates and Vitamin C.
Moran said that going without breakfast was not necessarily harmful to a person's physical well-being but that it certainly was not helpful. She also said that consistently going without breakfast might develop a bad habit for students, but that missing breakfast once in a while was no big deal.
"Occasionally missing a meal won't hurt people who are generally well-nourished," she said.
Old program was squelched, speaker says
By Novelda Sommers Kansan staff writer
The term "politically correct" hadn't been coined when a controversial humanities program operated at the University of Kansas in the 1970s.
Robert Carlson recounts the events that led to the Integrated Humanities Program's demise in his book, "Truth on Trial: Liberal Education Be Hanged." He said the freshman-sophomore program began in 1970 and ended in 1979, when professors in the program were accused of preaching Catholicism to students. KU administrators squelched the program because its teachings were not politically correct. Carlson said.
Carlson taught Latin classes to students in the program as a graduate student at the University but was not one of the professors KU investigated. He now is a professor of philosophy and humanities at Casper College and the University of Wowing in Casper.
Carlson will speak tomorrow at 7 p.m. at the Kansas Room in the Kansas Union about the controversy that surrounded the program and how the issues still are prominent in higher education. He will autograph books from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. in the Kansas Union bookstore.
Carlson said that what Dennis Quinn, John Senior and Frank Nelick — the three professors of the program — taught their students also offended people within and outside the academic community.
The professors taught from what are known as the great books, readings that included the works of Socrates, Dante, Aquinas and Augustine.
"There was, and still is, a dominant view called relativism, which argues that there is no truth," Carlson said. "These three professors said there was a truth, and the primary purpose of liberal arts was to help students know that truth."
Scott Bloch, now a Lawrence attorney, completed the two-year program in 1978. Bloch said the professors were attacked for asserting that the roots of western civilization were superior.
"Not the people of western civilization, but the literature, the philosophy, the mathematics were best," Bloch said. "But the camp that nothing was best was in the majority."
The program came under fire in 1977 when parents of some of the students in the program accused Quinn, Senior and Nelick of brainwashing students. Many students in the program had converted to Catholicism, and two of the professors were Catholic. A few men who had gone through the program joined monasteries.
Quinn, who is still a professor of English at KU, said he had not asked students to convert, although he did not deny that students may have seen the professors as role models.
In 1978, the dean of liberal arts and sciences formed a committee to determine whether there had been improprieties in the program, including evangelizing and allowing only one point of view in the classroom. The committee held sessions for three days and heard testimony from families of students, the professors, and others.
The committee found the professors not guilty of evangelizing but guilty of presenting only one point of view. The committee ruled that in the future, the program would have to present all points of view. In the end, Quinn said, the ruling killed the program.
Funds report required
By Sarah Wlese
Kansan staff writer
During Student Senate's finance committee meeting last night, members passed a bill requiring any funding guideline changes to be reported to full Senate at the following meeting by the committee's chairman.
A miscommunication about a guideline change made at the committee's second meeting of the semester created problems for a group seeking funding a few weeks ago.
When the committee changed the poster guideline from 200 posters to a flat cost of $150, not everyone found out about the change.
AMANZAA, a spectrum of students of journalism, went before the finance committee Oct. 18 seeking $660 for posters, the cost for 200 four-color posters to advertise several events during the year.
J. R. Clairborne, Black Pantherenic senator and AMANZAA bill sponsor, didn't know the guideline had been changed.
"They were holding the group responsible for their shortcom
ings." Clairborne said.
The following week in full Senate, the group's original $560-request was restored because the guideline change hadn't been conveyed to senators or campus groups.
Alan Pierce, finance committee chairman, said that the day after AMANZAA's appearance in finance, the revised version of the guidelines had been available.
"It's the job of the sponsoring senator of an organization to talk to the treasurer or myself about the guidelines before they write a bill," be said.
Cesar Millan, Liberal Arts and Sciences senator and sponsor of the bill requiring reported guideline changes, said the bill was necessary to avert future misunderstandings.
Gustavo Alvarado, International Council senator and finance committee member, said he thought some committee members were taking the guidelines too seriously.
Pierce agreed. Even if AMANZAA and Clairborne had known about the guideline, it doesn't mean they weren't justified in asking for a larger amount, he said.