Newspapers / North Carolina School of … / Dec. 1, 2000, edition 1 / Page 4
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page 4 features December 00 Got Florida? David Prater For the past several weeks Dr. Wilson’s Ethics and Leadership class has been quite busy preparing for the election. During an ex tended week end in October, parent ballots were sent home with students and 240 parents participated in the parental portion of S&M’s mock election. The parental results were tallied and then plotted against the votes of S&Mers that voted at the NCSSM is, undeni ably, one of the most challeng ing schools in the nation. With the combined pressure of dor mitory residence, rigorous, col lege-level classes and an active Texas Governor has already named prospective political appointments mock election held on Novem ber second and third during common lunch. The last group to participate in the mock elec tion was the staff, whom voted via email. After all of the votes were in, the election committee in Dr. Wilson’s class published the results on the election website and on the election board in Ground Watts. social environment. Science and Math has a tendency to cause students to be more adaptable and more accepting of ideolo gies that are somewhat more lib eral than what the same students might feel had they not come to Science and Math. This hypothesis is manifested in the graphs showing senior and jun ior presidential elects; the se niors were, on average, notice ably more liberal than the junior class. Quite possibly, the se niors extra year at S&M aided in this liberalization process. However, the most noticeable fissure is between the student body as a whole and the parents. Parents were notice ably more conserva tive than their chil dren. Dr. Wilson pro vided an ex- planation for this phenomenon. Wilson commented that the acquies cence of wealth and age creates conservative sentiments. “People tend to be most liberal when they are young”, noted Wilson. However, one other factor is of serious consider ation; North Carolina is a very conservative state. Parents of S&M students followed the general trend of the state, vot ing in favor of a republican can- didate with negli gible s u p - port of Green Party candi- dates or Re- f o r m Party candi dates. The nomi nees elected b y NCSSVl stu dents were unlike either the state or national trends. Students greatly supported the Demo cratic candidate with dispropor tionately low support of the Republican candidate (in accor dance with both state and na tional standards). There was also an exceptionally high amount of support for Green party and even Reform Party candidates. North Carolina had no support of the Green Party because Ralph Nader was not on the election ballot. C o n c 1 u - sively, both the age and situation of Science and Math students cause a lib eral trend. The liberal ization pro- c e s s I undergone by S&M I'n students separates them from the national and local standards. In the ultra-conser vative south and in our even di vided nation, it appears that S&Mers stand out strongly with their liberal views. How unfor tunate that our government’s ageist policies disallow our “un derage” votes. mm .f fiijUK .»•' Senior Expenses Katie Blackwell - ' Seniors: It’s too late. Jun iors; Read on and save your selves... Somewhere along the line I got the—rather faulty— impression that my money wor ries would start when 1 was accepted to college, and had to come up with the money to pay for tuition, transporta tion, and all that other good stuff. Then 1 be came I senior. All the money 1 had in my savings account won’t last until Feb ruary, much less until I start college and need to buy books, food, and all those other extra college ne cessities. The great est problem here is applying to college. 1 don’t think the col leges realize how much they’re asking applicants to spend. They seem to think seniors’ only application,expense is ap plication fees, which would be a reasonable (in most cases) amount, if that were true. How ever... Colleges have appar ently forgotten that they’re re quiring, in various combinations, the SAT 1, three SAT ll’s (at least one of which must be writing, the most expen sive of the lot), the ACT and the CSS profile. These are not cheap in the first place; they’re even worse if you apply to more than the four colleges included that matter, cutting out the tu ition you will have to pay (Skip to sophomore year? Lovely!). Fee waivers are sup posed to help cover testing costs, at least. But they run on gross income, not what your parents have left after Senior Jonathan Drew writes a check to a college, in the basic registration fee, and have to pay extra. This is ex actly what some people have to do, if they’re worried about not being accepted. Then there are the AP exams: even more expensive than the first batch of standard ized tests, and just as important for impressing colleges—or for expensive by themselves, but they don’t come alone. Com panies give seniors the option to order notices and invitations and thank you eards in the hope that relatives will realize how far in debt you’ve gone during your senior year and want to help you out. The neat goods they offer, from minia ture diplo mas to boxer shorts and jewelry,just make the whole prob lem worse. Thiric- ing about all the money I’ve begged off my parents in the past couple of months _ makes me application fees can get very ezpensive glad I got bills...gas...groceries...remodeling my class ring last year, because the bathroom after that small in cident with your sister’s pet snake and the electric toothbrush...College apps aren’t put above all else in the “real world”. Another part of the problem is the graduation kit. The cap and gown aren’t too this year it would just be too much on top of everything else. The biggest problem with senior expenses is that they jump on you en masse. From September to January, you have just five short months to mail applica tions, apply for financial aid, take all those tests (sometimes more than once for a better score) and order a cap and gown. It’s similar to the way teachers pile every undone thing into the last two weeks before the end of the quarter. Observers just sit back and watch the seniors stress. For me, the greatest annoyance is that if I had that much money this year. I’d spend it on completely different things, like going places with my fnends. We seniors are going to college next year, and not the same ones. Thirteen dollars for the SAT would cover a trip to Wal-Mart. Cornell costs 65 dollars—for that much money, I might actu ally be able to afford a movie ticket. Trying to pay for every thing right now is like being in college before we have a chance to graduate: it’s all homework and being broke. Of course, the ex penses I’m trying to meet right now are nowhere near as much as the (unaided) expense of at tending college. The problem is that nobody gives scholarships to cover applying to college, buying graduation materials, and the zillions of tests 1 have to take. There’s a little-publicized niche in the market of scholar ships; just a few hundred dol lars to help people survive their senior years. I can guarantee a lot of people would leap for ap plications the second they heard about it.
North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics Student Newspaper
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Dec. 1, 2000, edition 1
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