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The Belles
VOLUME XLIII, NUMBER 2 ST. MARY’S COLLEGE, RALEIGH, N.C.
of
St Mary ’s
College
NOVEMBER, 1981
St. Mary’s Campus Landscape
improving Slowly But Surely
by Kathleen Kincaid
Many students may be
wondering if we should
consider revising the, school
song, “In a grove of'stately
shrub bushes, where the
sunlight dominates...” etc. I,
myself was pretty concerned
about all the. plowing and
digging that was taking place
in front of the library, that is
when The Belles, decided to
get in touch with Mr. Conrad
to answer a few of our
questions. Mr. Conrad put my
worries right at ease and got
me really enthused about the
landscaping program. The
landscaping project was
proposed by the Trustees and
Grounds committee about two
years ago. The project
includes a campus-wide
redesignment. The project
was first initiated to create a
walkway system but rapidly
grew to include many areas of
the campus. The object of the
r^esignment is to create one
big “good” spot rather than
having the beautiful spots at
St. Mary’s competing or
racing with the “bad” spots.
St. Mary’s also hopes to
attract prospective students
and maybe encourage alumni
to contribute to the project. St.
Mary’s had architect Charles
A. Fink draw up the plans and
took bids from landscaping
firms. The major problem
they have run into is the
financial aspect of the project.
To give one an idea of how
overwhelming the cost is, an
estimate on Sie area in front
of the library, when
completed will include brick
walkways, lamp posts and
benches, is approximately
50,000 dollars! You can now
understand why all of this will
be a gradual process most
likely spread over ten years.
After talking to Mr. Conrad I
realized there is a lot more
involved in the project than
meets the eye. The plans for
the college are beautiful.
Don’t worry, all the trees
won’t be plowed over. The
change will be nice but there
will be respect for the
traditional atmosphere of St.
Mary’s.
SAT Scores Remain Steady
After Declining For 18 Years
College Board Program To Improve
Standards For High Schools and Colleges
The College Entrance
Examination Board has
announced a ten-year
program to improve the
quality of secondary and
university education by
setting well-defined standards
of academic preparation. The
project is called “Project
EQuality,” with the “E”
standing for equality of access
to education and the “Q”
standing for quality.
The College Board intends
to provide colleges and high
schools with a set of
definitions of educational
tasks. The high schools would
prepare students to meet the
standards, and the colleges
would be asked to accept the
standards as part of their
admissions criteria. "The
College Board, which
sponsors the Scholastic
Aptitude Test, widely used
examinations for college
admissions, would
presumably provide the
instruments to test whether
students have met the
academic standards.
The Board has already
worked with large numbers of
educators to begin to define
the skills that would be
specified in the new
standards. Six areas of
competence have already
been defined. They are
reading, writing, speaking
and listening, mathematics,
reasoning and studying. A
seventh area, observing,
would deal with more artistic
perceptions, and is currently
being worked on.
The following is a
selection from a larger
number of competencies that
have been defined by the
College Board in the first
three areas:
Reading
The ability to identify and
comprehend the main and
subordinate ideas in a written
work and to summarize the
ideas in one’s own words.
The ability to use the
features of books and other
reference materials such as
table of contents, preface,
introduction, titles and
subtitles, index, glossary,
appendix and bibliography.
The ability to recognize
different purposes and
methods of writing; to identify
a writer’s point of view and
tone; to interpret a writer’s
meaning inferentially as well
as literally.
Writing
The ability to conceive ideas
about a topic for the purpose
of writing.
The ability to improve one’s
Oak Trees
For the first time in
almost two decades, the
scores earned by high school
seniors on the Scholastic
Aptitude Tests did not go
down. Last year’s statistics
were released by the College
Board, sponsores of the tests,
and they received wide
publicity because the long
term decline has been a
source of great concern for
educators. It is impossible to
tell whether the 1981 statistics
represent a reversal of the
trend or simply a pause in a
decline that will be resumed in
own writing by restructuring,
correcting errors and
rewriting.
Speaking and Listening
The ability to engage
critically and constructively
in the exchange of ideas,
particularly during class
discussions and conferences
with instructors.
The ability to vary one’s use
of spoken language to suit
different situations.
Mathematics
The ability to perform, with
reasonable accuracy, the
computations of addition,
subtraction, multiplication
and division using natural
numbers, fractions, decimals
and integers.
The ability to make and use
measurements in both
traditional and metric units.
Critics of the College
Board and the Educational
Testing Service, which
prepares exams for the
Board, have argued in recent
years that the agencies have
too much power over the lives
of students. The new program
will probably be cited as a new
and significant example of the
growing power of such
agencies.
future years.
For high school seniors
who intended to go to college,
the average SAT scores in 1981
were 424 on the verbal section
and 466 on the math section.
When the decline in scores
began in 1963, the average
verbal score was 478 and the
average math score was 502.
The SATs are scored on a
scale that goes from 200 to 800.
The decline in scores had
leveled off since 1975, when
the scores fell sharply. This
may indicate that this year’s
results are indicators of a
long-term trends towards
ending the decline.
The Scholastic Aptitude
Tests are taken by about 1.5
million students each year.
Male students continued to get
higher scores than females.
Men earned an average score
of 430 on the verbal and 492 on
the math portions of the exam,
while the scores for women
were 418 and 443.
The scores among men in
1981 increased by two points in
math and one point on the
verbal part of the test. Verbal
scores for women declined by
two points but remained the
same in math.
The significance of the
new scores is not entirely
clear because the decline has
never been fully understood.
Some educators and
researchers have believed
that the decline represented a
weakening of educational
programs. Others have
explained them in terms of the
mixture of students taking the
exam and intending to go on to
college. It is inevitable,
however, that some educators
will point to the new statistics
as evidence for the claim that
new programs in the schools
are working.
In A Grove Of Stately
“To put off doing
something until later; delay.”
That’s how, Webster’s defines
procrastinate. I like calling it
tomorrow and I am definitely
a do later or put offer. The
problem with calling it
tomorrow is that it will often
be due today. This seems to be
a major problem especially
around this dreadful time of
year (Unless of course, the
^itor does not get her tail out
of that bed and the poor
procrastinated put off from
the printers paper is not
published until next year!!) I
was worried that I was the
only one capable of such, so
after putting it off for a good
or so, I finally got
around to asking others;
“What do you most often
procrastinate about?” Dr.
Murray’s desk looks like a
New York alley - he refuses to
clean it. The professor of
everyone’s favorite class still
has not given me his reply -
sllaaack! The class as a whole
would like to put off those
Monday econ. quizzes
permanently. I was most
distressed with Dean Miller’s
response: “I don’t
procastinate.” That someone
could be so normal and near
perfect apalled me.
Nevertheless, my next victim
made me feel much better.
Debbie Shelley said, “Let me
call you tomorrow.” The
funny thing about that was
neither Mrs. Shelley or myself
realized her mistake. For
those of you strange few who
still don’t know how to master
this fine practice, here’s a
quick lesson that is worth
delaying. First, sit back. If
you happen to nod off, no
problem there because we will
worry about it tomorrow.
Secondly, begin thinking
about how much you have to
do. It also helps to think about
how much you really don’t
want to do it. Think longer. IF
you have done these simple
steps, played every album,
rearranged your closet, room,
thoughts and life, it is now
time to get to work.
Tomorrow. (For the results of
procrastination, tune into
semester grades.)