PAGE 2 The Community Senate In a week and a half it will be time again to elect the members and officers of the Community Senate. While no petitions or platforms have been announced, we would like to discuss some things to watch for when surveying candidates. This of course assumes that there will be more than one slate. If oidy one slate of candidates file, we suggest that a yes/no option be placed on the ballot so that there is some manner of choice involved. The Community Senate is still a new animal, quite different from the Student Legislature which preceeded it, and, candidates for office should be judged by standards applicable to it, rather than to traditional "Student Government" organizations. Perhaps the best definition of the character of the Senate is "creative disfunction." Roughly translated this means that the Senate is not a body of persons fumbling around with useless rhetorical arguments, frittering away any chances for action in internal politicking. The Senate should be a body stripped of non-essentials, performing maintenance functions such as financial planning, translation of student opinion to faculty and administration, and representation of the student body to persons and organizations in the outside community. This is the "disfunction" part of the definition. It does not mean the Senate -liould be a dormant body, but that it should be streamlined so that the functions it performs are efficient and effective. What energy it has should be concentrated rather than dissipated. The "creative" portion of our implies that the Senate should be able to be a launching point for ideas of individual students and student groups. Long, parliamentary procedures can kill a good idea very easily. The Community Senate Should be a place where projects, services, and plans formulated by students are introduced into the whole college community. It should not be a place where 0MM&% 55 Ml 3 /cheepA /cheFPA V CHEEP/ /CHEEP r CHFfPy U^- -r* i L.—l! mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmz;-^mmm - ;„ , - & , THE GUILFORDIAN these plans and ideas are co-opted and internalized by the government organization. Creativity does not mean forming a committee. It means serving as both a funnel to direct individual and group activity to the place it will best function, and as an umbrella, giving validity to a wide range of student initiated activity. On the' first score, that of streamlining and concentrating, this year's Senate and officers have done an admirable job of dismanteling useless machinery, and establishing efficient government in its place. To date however, the Senate has been much less of a creative body than it has the potential to be. The energies of the Senate should go in two almost opposite directions, dissasembling while creating. This year's Senate has gone basically in only one of these, dissasembling, perhaps because the two directions seem contradictory, and they chose one over the other. Both are possible, and necessary. The Senate has been involved with a few creative functions this year, but the potential exists for much more. We hope that candidates for Executive Council and Dorm & Day representatives to the Senate will address themselves not only to particular issues, but to their thoughts on the functions of the Senate. Running for election on a platform of issues will be totally useless and misleading unless candidates specify how they intend to deal with them. The Senate will be sponsoring a forum for candidates before the elections which will be a good opporl unity to question them on this matter. The GUILFORDIAN will print statements of platforms by candidates for office if the candidate so desires. Student Government, viewed for so long as a total farce, has the potential to be an active agent, voice, and gathering ground for us, if, and only if, it is understood and utilized, not as a end in itself, but as an apparatus of service and creativity. Ify QuilfonSon The Guilfordian is published by the editors and staff weekly except for examination periods and vacations. The Guilfordian is not an official publication of Guilford College, and the opinions expressed herein are solely those of the authors and editors. Office: Rm. 223, Cox Old North. Phone 292-8709. Mailing address: Guilford College Greensboro, N.C. 27410. Subscription rates: 54.00 per year, $2.50 per semester, distributed free of charge on the Guilford College Campus. Editor, Kyd D. Brenner, Business Manager, Terry L. Romine, Managing Editor, Jeanette Ebel, Photography, Jerry Clawges. Advertising, Marc Weiner, Cartoon, Steve McCraw, John Meyler, Sports, Jim Shields, Staff, Carla McKinney, TerryWyszynski, Susan Hardee, Clare Glore, Sue Scheider, Doug Scott, Karen Reehling, David Rhees, Dede Jones, Susan Pujdak, Thorn Rednour, Mollie McNair, Randy Hopkins, Tori Potts. Letters to the Editor Dear Sir: Mr. Avery's recent letter (Jan. 14) about the correlation between good campus citizenship and attendance at home football games shows that Mr. Avery's college experience is limited to the academic atmosphere. It seems unfair and inconsiderate of him to approach this correlation, as it may be, looking at only one side. Granted, Guilford College is an academic institution; but Mr. Avery is overlooking the fact that there are 1,000 plus students here, all pursuing an education not 950 students at an institution and 50 some athletes at a training camp. The athletes at Guilford are also seeking an education and should be included in the "we" Mr. Avery so selectively uses. Everyone cannot cope financially with Guilford College. Some of those who cannot play sports to help pay for an education. There are many aspects to Guilford College. Each "thing," each of us, becomes involved in new educational experiences, hopefully through more than JJuman Condition by Douglas Scott If you recall, from last week's exciting episode to this week's heavy hound, the Intrepid Companion and myself became becalmed in northern west North Carolina mountain terrain. As they bounced up and down near vertical mountain paths in search of a lighted house barely visible on the lip of an upper Ridge Road (for where else would one expect hippies of the collegiate genre to be?) They ran into a rock. Not a huge rock by any measure known, but a sufficient rock, when taken with its partner in crime, the bend in the road, sufficient to set red lights a-blinking and the glint of oil running away towards the valley. Fit to the end, the house lights had disappeared in the chaos. We gave up, crawled in the back of the station wagon into a sleeping bag under a blanket, to sleep, not to awake until one o'clock the next afternoon. We might as well have been on the moon as we slept. The stark landscape could so easily have been the grave yard of intergalactic craft, lost in the destruction of the sixth planet by the Vorbish. None survived. They were still. FEBRUARY 18, 1972 just the academic aspect of college. I suggest that Mr. Avery broaden his insights. I believe his retort to Mr. Welborn's statements are unfounded and unnecessary. Bob Vinson To the Editor: With the slogan "Save the Children," Shirley Chisholm is attempting to put choice, rather than the traditional American process of picking the lesser of two evils, into the political arena for the coming year. Many people, including Shirley, realize "They all look alike" when viewing the white, male presidential hopefuls for this year. I would like for anyone on and around the Guilford campus who is interested in being involved in Shirley's campaign by helping alleviate the scarcity of reports on Shirley's campaign by the corporate news media and getting her programs implemented in other platforms, given the possibility she may not win the Democratic nomination, to meet in Founders lobby this Monday at 6:00 p.m. Tom Clayton Wake up in the morning with a blanket over your head without the where-with-all to get a drink of water. Dribble down the slope to a sign of life. "Gus Washburn" the mail box simply states. "Gus Washburn Realtor" shouts the red and blue 5x5 sign next to his mailbox, "Rentals, Summer Houses, and Mortgages." Gus Washburn, the same notorious supporter of Carolina and the Washington Redskins, local alcoholic who called a wrecker (woebe, for the wrecker had just left for another wreck; the sad tale of Jeanette's flying Chevrolet) itook us right where we wanted to go. Sympathy we should suspect, after hours of trying, colossal adventures including the country quickie motel, restaurant, gas station and general store, the rock slide, and the sufficient rock saga, we should appreciate a few condolences, even if they were not required. We, we find are the second wreck of the day and the stereo had become a mono by frying a fuse and everybody was all wacked out besides, gol dam. It took all day to get straightened out, so we went to sleep.

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