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Page 2, Salemite, November 2,1979
Editorial
Ta-dum! Not only another issue of the
paper, but an editorial to boot.
It is always nice to hear you have been
missed. Staff and I have been steadily asked
recently when we were planning to publish
again. Good question. We have not been on
vacation; our problem can be termed as
“insufficient”, as in time and money. Our
allotment for the year does not provide for
weekly publication. As for time, I am not sure
I can define the term as it seems to be
something we appear to have run out of on
occasion. Anyway, thanks for asking. Your
concern is the reason that when we do publish
it has to be first class.
This week’s issue reflects many sides of
Salem, with tongue in cheek one could say
from the ridiculous to the sublime. There are a
few.things I would like to comment on briefly.
Inaguration was the first time I have been
not only happy to don cap and gown, but also
honored to play a small role in a proud and
beautiful story. There is something magical
about this ye^r at Salem, it seems as if the
kind fates have tinged our days here golden.
There are those moments as you walk across
campus, sit in the refectory or look out your
window when your chest tightens and your
next breath is suspended by an unconscious
love and respect for just being somewhere
that leaves you breathless. There was an
entire day like this: October 16th, 1979, Dr.
Richard Morrill’s inaguration as Salenft 16th
president. For those of us that shared in this
day, it shall be a cherished memory.
There are more projects underway at Salem
now than leaves in the square or rats in the
shadows. It is essential we be as aware of
these plans and presentations, as we are of the
latter. Security is moving from a cheap joke to
a valuable reality, because students have
voiced their concern. The student center is no
longer an iffy proposal battered about in
meetings, but a place to batter about other
proposals with the insight from a beer or two.
Lecture Assembly is in the process of
presenting their symposium on the sixties and
the seventies generation is paying close at
tention to where they have been and where
they are going. A conference on Women:
Careers in Science was met with over
whelming response, which ensures future
programs of this quality.
May I re-iterate this is a magical time to be
at Salem, because its family is indeed special.
Laura Castellanos del Valle
Editor
TU S alemiie
Printed by Lindsay Publishing Co. and published
every Friday of the College year by the Student
Body of Salem College.
Editor - Laura Caalellanoa del Valla
Aaaoclata Editor • Mlaay Littleton
Layout Editor - Pam Snyder
Co-editora of Photography - Persia Thomson, Uura Babb
Staff: Katherine Graver
Business Manager - QIaalle Thompson
Assistant to Bus. Mgr. • LaVerne Hales
Circulation Manager - Nancy Coudriat
Arts Editor- Aria Tubb
Copy Editor - Joan Gentry
Reporters: Harriet Calhoun
Mary Ann Tuggle Lucy LucMiardt
.Susan Butler, Dee Anna Leonard
Karen Moya, Robin Elmore, Patee White
Letters to the Editor
To the Salem College Community
Any time the Admissions Office has an
activity on campus, such as entertaining
prospective students or sponsoring counselor
workshops, the Admissions staff can do the
organizing and even some of the leg work, but
we must always rely on the support of the total
community for its success. In the seven years
I have been in Admissions at Salem, I have
been pleased time and time again by the
overwhelming interest the community ex
presses and the assistance it gives. And my
confidence in you has once more been
justified, as the success of the recent over
night for prospective students attests.
I thank all of you who played a part in this
undertaking, and I am especially grateful to
Martha Walker and the Fremdendienerin,
Jean Fleming and the Senior Class, Suzanne
McCaskill and the Dansalems, Patsy Miller
and the Archways, Dr. Morrill, Dean Helmick,
Dr. Lazarus, Dr. McKnight, Dr. Aanstad, Ms.
French, Mr. Short, and Arie Tubb.
Very sincerely,
Mary Scott Best
Security update
Security...the age old problem and issue on Salem
College’s campus. What in the world is being done?
Have no fear. Dr. Morrill’s sub-committee on
Security is very active trying to get recom
mendations for improvement presented to him by
November 15th. The students have added a great
deal of support by taking the time to seriously
consider the student questionnaire and fill it out. A
very impressive student interest was displayed (325
questionnaires to be exact). The committee wants
to thank the students for their opinions and ideas
and the results will be given soon.
We have a problem with Security at the present
time; meaning, all members of the Salem Com
munity need to work together. All Salem students
need to be aware of the important role they play in
this predicament. Students need to be on their toes
and remain aware of their responsibility for their
own safety. Until revisions and improvements are
made in our system, we need to make ourselves less
vulnerable! We can never leave our safety up to
others-no matter how good the security is. The
main responsibility for our personal security rests
on our own shoulders and no one else’s.
Progress is being made toward the improvement
of our Security system but always be on the safe
side and be precautions. How can you do that?
1. Know the security beeper number (761-9231)
and the procedure for using the beeper. (Dial the
number, wait for the beep, state your need clearly
and be precise. Yoii will get no verbal response
from the beeper. Dial the number again, state your
need to make sure the message was received.)
2. Don’t walk on campus alone at night! If it is
absolutely necessary, that you walk alone, go on a
spree and invest in a whistle so at least you can
make a commotion if an emergency arises.
3. Be sure to lock your car and put valuables in
the trunk!
4. Don’t hesitate to call a security guard to in
vestigate a stranger seen on campus. By all means,
don’t let just anyone walk in your dorm because he
says he’s the vending machine man or telephone
man, etc. Feel free to question him or at least
report it to the residence hall director.
These are simple common sense protections that
are so easily taken for granted. We have problems
with security-that’s a fact-and something is ac
tually being done about it due to student interest.
But let’s not let interest turn into paranoia by
getting too “worked-up”. If we look out for each
other and ourselves by being aware of our own
responsibilities, wel’ll be taking a step toward a
more effective Security System on Salem campus.
'The Future of the Past”cont.
the
obvious can
be
exciting.
As a liberal arts school and
college and as one for young
women, we remain committed to
several other allegedly ill-fated
pursuits. Now is not the time
or the place to bring out all
our big guns in support of these
two characteristics. Let me
merely suggest that through these
we can become a distinctive
model of an alive and re
sponsive and rigorous liberal
education. The changes in the
lives and opportunities for
women are showing us the way.
Women now have a choice
about the kind of lives they will
lead. Theirs is no longer the
silent expectation of the women’s
role as a delicate or passive
observer of cultural and
political life. It has been OUR
students, and not some abstract
movement, that have caused us
to rethink the shape of liberal
education at Salem. It is now
increasingly an education
which actively acknowledges a
wide horizoa of future possibilities.
Surely it is more practical, but
not by confusing education with
vocational training. Its practicality
resides in its addressing more
fully a broader scope of life's
texture and potential. It acknow
ledges and seeks to prepare
women for new public and pro
fessional responsibilities, much
as liberal education has always
done for men. Ute focus is shifting
and should shift toward the in
sight and knowledge and values
that are required for intelligent
choice and decision in a
democratic society. Our democracy
faces more than its share of
troubling issues, and re
quires new civic virtues of us all.
The old educational virtues of
contemplative wisdom and know
ledge for its own sake should
not be abandoned, but given
point and purpose and focus
around the themes of choosing,
acting, and deciding in the wider
world. Liberal education may
well prove not just to be the
icing on the cake, but the whole
cake.
a variety of fields through dis
tribution requirements or a code
program. Tbe question usually
left hanging is how these diverse
studies can be given intellectual
coherence and integration. We
need a way to see the re
lationships among different ways
of knowing, and to focus con
sciously on the abiding and
substantive questions of human
experience. What does it mean
to be human? What are the limits
and possibilities of knowledge?
What are my personal and civic
obligations? What ought 1 to
do?
There is another facet of
educational wholeness that is
virtually unique to us as a dual
but single institution. It concerns
the ability we have as unified
to be better and stronger than
we odienvise mif^ be as separate.
We already have made consider
able progress in sharing resources,
programs and facilities between
the academy and the college, but
even more can be done. Gmsider,
for example, the great advantage
for advanced students at the
Academy to get a head start
in higher education by taking
courses at the college. This has
been started, and it should grow.
The Academy and its programs,
on the other hand, offers the
college an excellent chance to
meet the needs of the many
able students who wish to start
college after their junior year in
high school. Salem would be in
the rare position of being able
to offer college preparatory work
for early entrants who want to
need it in one or several areas.
contes*
simply from the ^
courses, but from
confirmation by a
the student and her ideas
That someone knows and
how you think and wha^
think, that they invest
in you, is an affirmation
when unspoken.
Rausenbush, like Perry-
that the magic in good I
comes from the student s
part of an important Enter?^
one that is being shared
teacher. She says that J
students cherish above all
is, “...That they
teacher is going through ^
thing’ with them. The
communion lasts. Such
care about what becom^
their students.” How all dm
ever happen in mass
education is a hard questio®' ^
We should not
distinctive and m
teaching is easy or
It is exhausting 'and dm
work. When it is set if
context of the current 1**^
professional mobiliW m
fields, and placed
narrow borders of the
school and college
are lew persons in one’s su^
the danger of professional ^
out is very real. When
realities of change hit a
institution the results e*® .
painful. There is no place to
One cannot get lost in
or in departmental ^
The answer is that the vital s^
hit"'
schools and colleges of the
have to line a way to ^
professional renewal a
opportunity. At Salem dti* ^
is underway. We should •***
Liberal education
may well prove not
just to be the icing on
the cake, but the
whole cake.
expand the possibilities ^
summer sabbaticals, ^
seminars, professional trave
Women now have a
choice about the kind
of lives they will lead.
As we look ahead, there are
several areas in which we can
Diana JoUiff
Pres.of SGA
express our uniqueness
directly in the curriculum. In
particular, at the college we are
in a position to develop a model
approach to pre
professional preparation for
women in medicine, law, business
and other professions. We can
avoid the narrow gribd that
these programs often involve,
and provide a supportive setting
that offers positive and
attractive alternatives if the
student’s initial choke does not
^materialize.
In our programs at both the
academy and the college we have
a chance to strike an important
and badly needed integrative
theme. Liberal education typically
includes an emphasis on general
education-on an exposure to
In defining who we are and
what we can do best our small
size is essential. We, and others
like us, speak constantly of the
priority we give to teaching and
of the personal commitment we
make to it. We speak mudi
less, though, of what
educationally important or dis
tinctive in small size. Surely
this is needed for in being small
we give up the endless diversity
of program that large publk
schools and universities can
offer. As faculty members at
the college we also sacrifice a
primary commitment to basic
research and to constant
publication, and the professional
costs 'of this are high.
What justifies our smallness is
not simply a one-to-one
relationship with students, or even
that faculty and students become
friends, or even small classes.
Our smallness should have a
primary benefit for LEARNING,
for education, or it is pleasant
but not decisive. The potency in
being small is in the personal
intellectnal engagement that we
can foster. Our faculties sedt their
fulfillment in the fulfillment of
others-their students. William
Perry’s studies of Harvard
students have shown that in
tellectual maturity and com
mitment come most decisively not
sabbatical and study
should seek new opport»|’'^^
too, such as the possibfl^
professional exchanges
cultural and business otgtf ^
in the city. Through ®'® ^
reliance and commitm*®** ^
should be able to tak*
threat out of change and j
rewards and open horizons t®
professional lives.
Salem is special. Out ^
hopes for the future 1^
is reside
flight away from home,
bu
a voyage cl setf-disoovery.
is guaranteed because our
stretches back 200 years- ^
nothing is lost because
a small, independent liber*! ^
institution for women. M*®*^,
the days ahead will be
for we have chosen to
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as strengths what the wider
calls weaknesses. We shall >
the strong and unpreced*®^
support and confidence ®^ y
are and love Salem, for >® ^
smallness and
independence we are
vulnerable. But what we
beyond financing, beyond
programs, beyond good
ment, is an unshakable
in ourselves and in the hu^
importance of what we d®
what we stand for. If we
strong our sense of self'"' i
all Oil %AfC .
and self-coofidenoe, then ure ^
do far more than survive- j
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shall excel. Then we shall
count our past as a lost
age, but as a prelude for the *
of Salem which lies ahead.