North Carolina Newspapers

sljp Satlg iar Brrl Effective Student Advising at UNC Undergraduates Must Play Their Part in the System Oscar Wilde once quipped, “All advice is bad; good advice is worse." Those of us who work in the junior/ senior advising office on the third floor of Steele Building sometimes suspect that too many students share Wilde’s view. Fora variety of reasons, a few no doubt well founded and others a bit exaggerated, some students believe we have little inter est in helping them navigate the maze of requirements and options lying between them and a Carolina degree. Worst yet is the notion that we delight in giving stu dents bad news (“ Oh, about that last course you thought you didn’t need for gradua tion ...”) Popular opinion notwithstanding, the office staff, faculty advisers and deans in the College of Arts and Sciences actually do want students to graduate on time, and we feel frustrated when we so regularly see students coming by too late for our advice to help, or who don’t believe what the catalog says or what we told them last time. To help convince you that the third floor of Steele Building is serious about top-quality advising, we are offering anew Electronic Advising Service this semester. We now have an e-mail address you can use to ask any question you wish. Under stand: I’m not promising we can answer any question you ask. But do drop me a line at a&s@unc.edu with general ques tions about various majors or career op tions, or with specific questions about your Broke and Bleeding: How the Proposed Budget Cuts Will Affect Graduate Students Needless to say, this past week has been a stressful one. After my faithful 226 votes swept me to President “elect” status, the phone has yet to stop ringing. The basic question: “Did I feel that Gov. Hunt’s budget proposals would affect graduate students at Carolina.” Uh, yeah. The governor’s proposal calls for an increase in in-state tuition by 3 percent and out-ofstate tuition by lOpercentforeachof the next three years to help pay offhis $483 million tax cut. While I understand the desire to cut taxes, education is a poor choice to absoib the blunt end of the blow. The only cuts that will occur will be the quality of education the state receives and ! the only breaks will be the banks and backs of already undersupported graduate stu dents. Way back in 1992, Gov. Jim Hunt was actually concerned about the effects his proposed tuition increases would have on the UNC system. So concerned that he established the Government Performance Audit Committee to gauge public percep tion and make recommendations to the governor on such issues. According to its report, “The State’s potential to raise tu ition should be used in the future only for Professor Hall's Tar Heel Analogy Grasps at Straws TO THE EDITOR: On Thursday, Feb. 16,1995, the DTH printed a powerful editorial by Dt. Fred X Hall (“Fred X Hall: Racism Remains ‘Sugar-Coated’ at UNC”). He raised some good questions. Questions I’m sure many of us, of all races, have asked time and again. And I respect his right to an opinion and to voice it as he sees fit. I even have respect for forming analogies, but only if they are logical. Fred X Hall’s comparison of the Tar Heel nickname to suppressing the black race seems to be grasping at straws. Every legend I’ve read about why we’re the Caro lina Tar Heels has nothing to do with race. In fact, the basic foundation of the nick name always goes back to how tar, pitch, and turpentine were the major cash prod ucts of North Carolina. The best-known legend is about Revolutionary War sol diers having the determination to continue onevenafterwadingthrougharivercoated with tar. Tar symbolizes tar; nothing more, nothing less. Overanalyzation of some thing can never lead to anything produc tive. If there must be an explanation of the symbolism of the Tar Heel, would it not be hotter to think of the tar as a sign all Caro lina students stick with their ambitions and hold fast to their dreams? Season Coleman FRESHMAN BIOLOGY Focusing on Race Imagery Wastes Hall's Talents TO THE EDITOR: Dear Mr. Fred Hall, This is in response to your column con cerning white attitudes concerning blacks, within this university, and around the world (“Fred X Hall: Racism Remains ‘Sugar- Coated’ at UNC,” Feb. 16). Though I know little about you or your background, I truly respect what you have to say. I just have a few things to say to you; which, perhaps, can enlighten your life. To begin, my best friend in Atlanta, Ga., is Hakeem Brock, who attends Morehouse College. Hakeem is a proud African American who esteems every part of his heritage. He has grievances against society, but he is not full ofhate towards it. He makes the most of what he has, as every man, woman and child should. He entered a white corporate speech contest, and | lOSEPII I.OWMAN own require ments or any problems you GUEST COLUMNIST are having with UNC administrators even advisers or staff in our own office. If you want specific questions about your record answered, please include your full name to be sure we consult the correct student folder. I cannot promise that I can solve your problem or that you will be happy with what I find out, but lean promise to answer your inquiry promptly, ff students find this service usefiil, we may expand it to the General College or selected departments next year. In the meantime, I have put together two Top 10 lists for your amusement: “The Top 10 Reasons You Should Go See Your Arte and Sciences Adviser” and “The Top 10 Reasons You May Not Graduate On Time.” Just because these lists are intended to be humorous does not mean we in Steele Building do not take our advising respon sibilities or students’ problems seriously. Unfortunately, we encounter the miscon ceptions and hear the comments illustrated here far too often. Perhaps publicizing them in an entertaining way will help prevent them in the future. Top 10 Reasons Yon Should Go See Your Arts and Sciences Adviser (Back ground Music: The Beastie Boys, “DlCom munication”) 10. It’s raining, so you might as well kill some time hanging out with the other stu dents on the third floor of Steele Building. 9. Any problems you are having with courses at Carolina won’t seem so bad after eavesdropping on other students talk ing among themselves about THEIR prob lems. 8. The view of South Building and Polk Place from the third-floor windows is great! the purpose of strengthening the higher education systems’ service to North Caro linians.” Its predicted results, “Students and potential students will receive increased or improved services in return for increases in tuition. ” What a difference a year or two makes oris it an election year ortwo. Gov. Hunt, you are not cutting taxes, you are cutting the state’s access to higher educa tion and a more profitable life, profit and service to this state and your coffers. Gov. Hunt, the “Education Governor,” evidently does not realize the benefit that graduate and professional students pro vide the nation, state and university com munities, regardless of their origin. We are involved in 40 percent of the teaching of undergraduates. Some may be full profes sors, recitation leaders or graders, yet all are important components of an efficient and thorough curriculum. We perform a large bulk of the research that brought in $244 million in contracts and grants to the state. We, along with an excellent and deserving faculty, have UNC in the top 20 of total federal support dol lars, No. 1 in the Southeast. How many magazines must be printed that have UNC and its graduate programs ranked among the nation’s elite? placed second. As well, he has a dream to be a powerful lawyer, someday. Secondly, myself, I am a white, deaf, soon to be blind teenager. I by no means have the facilities to live the endowed life that you have. I cannot serve in the mili tary, nor could I ever be an airline pilot, or an entire host of things. Yet, I zealously pursue life with a love for every part of it. The key to success in life is not noticing the hidden imagery in UNC’s mascot, or how society persecutes you, but rather, marching forward past your grievances, and making the most of every single thing you have. I for one, hope to attain the level of education that you have, and if I stop to listen to everything that society tells me I can’t do, then I never will. It is obvious that society can never fully accommodate you, Hakeem, orl,but is it important what they do for us, or what we show them we can do? Dm Bryant FRESHMAN EDUCATION Hall's Logic Depended Upon a Cratch of Racism TO THE EDITOR: I felt compelled to respond to Fred “X” Hall’s amazing critique of the Tar Heel logo (“Fred X Hall: Racism Remains ‘Sugar-Coated’ at UNC,” Feb. 16). Step aside Plato and Socrates, Mr. Hall has perfected an increasingly popular type of logic, one that is based entirely on the crutch of racism. This branch of thought allows the black man to pull examples of racism and oppression right out of thin air, even if the end result clearly doesn’t make any damn sense! This new type oflogic can be used to point fingers at everybody with out consequence. Move over, Red Scare!! The Tar Heel logo does indeed show tar on the bottom of a heel. And yes, whenever lack of money dictates, the heel is colored white. And yes, my friend, the tar is always coloredblack. Why? What does it all mean? Could it be a metaphor for the oppression of an entire race? Newsflash TAR IS BLACK! It always has been, and it always will be. I guess the person who initially drew the logo could have made the tar white and the heel black, but that wouldn’t have made nearly as much sense, would it? Have you ever stepped in white tar? Any North Carolina history bookcleariy explains the roots of the logo. I find it hard to believe that Mr. Hall has never read about its origin. However, he instead chooses to use some sort of perverted wis- EDITORIAL 7. If you come by during the slow times —most any time except during the first few weeks of the semester and around preregistration you can take a nap or meditate in the quiet waiting area. Alterna tively, you can brag to your friends about how easy it was to see your adviser. 6. The SRC’s full but you can always get in your afternoon workout by making a couple of trips up and down the Steele Building Stairmaster. 5. If you are lucky, one of the staff members (or deans) will break out in an aria from some Italian opera. 4. You can enjoy listening to the staff get frustrated by their fancy new computers. (Beapal, offer to help them find what they want in Windows.) 3. You may find that you DO NOT NEED the course you thought you were taking to fulfill a perspective requirement after all. (Of course you may find that you DO need something else you don’t have— what suspense!) 2. Your Arts & Sciences advisers can help you avoid the many self-advising pit falls that can keep you from graduating on time. (Do you really want to have to ex plain to your Aunt Agnes why your name isn’t in the program on Commencement Sunday?) 1. Your mother would want you to. Top Ten Reasons You May Not Gradu ate on Time (Background Music: Smashing Pump kins, “Blue”) 10. You regularly take an underload (say 12 hours a semester for 8 semesters) and then come by during the spring of your senior year to say, “What do you mean I need eight more courses after this semes ter? That’s a whole year!” 9. You never really understood the non- Westem/comparative history requirement and figured that if you didn’t understand ELECT eryone else. Over 60 per- cent of graduate students remain in the state to work and pay taxes upon gradua tion. We are the fiiture doctors, lawyers, teachers and business leaders of this state. Many of us take on additional jobs to pay our rent, loan debts and health insurance. The average TA at UNC gets $6,656 and research assistants $9,830. This ranks last in comparison to schools we directly com pete against for the best students. Most of these schools also offer full or partial tu ition waivers as well as health insurance coverage. UNC has had 1,120 tuition re missions since 1984. There are still 385 graduate students in some teaching capac- READEmORUM The Daily Tar Heel welcomes reader comments and criticism. Letters to the editor should be no longer than 400 words and must be typed, double spaced, dated and signed by no more than two people. Students should include their year, major and phone number. Faculty and staff should include their title, department and phone number. The DTH reserves the right to edit letters for space, clarity and vulgarity. dom to twist it into a mythical racist em blem. His viewpoint is a testament to the fact that stupidity can always be brought to a higher level. I do not deny that “sugar-coated rac ism” exists. I also do not mean to insult the intelligence of an assistant professor of sociology. The fact is, with all of the ex amples ofracismoutthere(racism by blacks and racism by whites), why devote energy toward making up such ridiculous non sense? Most anyone can quickly come up with dozens of empty, meaningless, racist metaphors. As proof, I implore you to watch “The Dark Side with Nat X.” How ever, there is a big difference between fan tasy and reality. The next time you seek to bring racism to the spotlight, at least use a credible example. Until then, I’ll be on the lookout for some white tar. Daniel Niblock JUNIOR JOURNALISM Cunningham Mistaken About Need for Architect TO THE EDITOR: At the Black Student Movement Candi dates Forum on Wednesday, Feb. 8,1995, Calvin Cunningham, a candidate for stu dent body president, announced that he’d like to help the Sonja H. Stone Black Cul tural Center find an architect. The Daily Tar Heel repeated Mr. Cunningham's state ment as a quote in the Thursday, Feb. 9, 1995, story on the Black Student Move ment endorsements (“Brandenburg Gets Nod From BSM for Experience”). I’m pleased to inform Mr. Cunningham, The Daily Tar Heel, and its readers that the Sonja H. Stone Black Cultural Center has already hired an architectural firm to plan the freestanding center. I’m sure if you - suiLftiNfe y ARTS i Wm Ml©®!! / the rule it couldn’t really be THAT impor tant. 8. You knew you had flunked a Math 31 course freshman year but hoped you’d get some credit for at least trying such a hard course. 7. You took Spanish 1 at UNC even though you had three years of Spanish in high school (“Hey, I thought this would be an easy way to pad my GPA”) and didn’t realize you would not receive graduation credit for a first-semester language course if you had studied the language in high school. ity that do not receive remissions to the in state tuition level. Even outstanding un dergraduates will now be looking toward less costly and more supportive graduate schools in other states decreasing our pre ferred applicant pools as well as the quality ofteaching,research and service they would have been able to provide at UNC. In two years, out-of-state tuition will cost over $10,000.1 guess we can just borrow more. Unfortunately, that is where the federal government steps in. A major provision of the Republican Party’s “Contract With America” is the elimination of the in-school interest ex emption subsidy on guaranteed student loans no w paid by the federal government. Students with subsidized loans would be able to defer interest payments until they leave school, however, this additional in terest would be added to their loan princi pal. Under this proposal, the total debt of a graduate student borrowing the maximum amount for five years would increase by 28 percent, from $42,500 to $54,000. This estimate does not take into account those who already have undergraduate loans. Nor does it represent most professional schools where loan amounts are much larger. On Feb. 14, President Clinton vowed review the minutes of the Friday, Jan. 27, 1995, Board of Trustees meeting or the Tuesday, Jan. 31, 1995, edition of The Daily Tar Heel (“Research Triangle Firm to Design Freestanding BCC”), you will discover that the Freelon Group of Re search Triangle Park has been approved for the project. If Mr. Cunningham, or anyone else for that matter, would sincerely like to help the BCC in any of its endeavors, please contact Vice Chancellor Harold Wallace, BCC interim director; Dean Harold Woodard, chairman of the BCC Advisory Board; Michelle Thomas, program director for the center; or Michelle Johnson, vice chair woman of the Advisory Board at the BCC. Thank you. MuMe Johnson SENIOR COMMUNICATION STUDIES AND AFROAMERICAN STUDIES CAA Ticket Distribution Invokes Anger, FrastratioH TO THE EDITOR: On Monday the 13th I sent this letter to our CAA co-presidents in regard to my dissatisfaction with their method of Senior ticket distribution. As I have received NO response from these elected representa tives, I am forwarding this letter to you as an “open letter” to Ms. Dilal and Ms. Rasmussen. I hope you will feel free to use this letter “as is” or as a starting point by which to launch your own investigative report into the handling of this upsetting incident Dear CAA Co-Presidents: Unfortunately it appears that once again you will be required by good taste and a sense of responsibility to run the gantlet by trying to explain to die student body the 6. You thought you could still take a course at your local community college after completing 64 hours and have it count for graduation (“What do you mean the credits are no good? The course I took there after freshman year counted.”) 5. You counted your two one-hour PE activity courses in the 120 academic hours required for graduation (“What? I have only 118 hours toward graduation!”) 4. You knew you took Chem 61 again after making a D the first time, but you never realized the hours from both times wouldn’t count toward graduation. to the American Council of Education to keep the interest subsidy as well as work to restore the tax deductibility of interest paid on student loans eliminated in the 1986 Tax Reform Act Currently, there are both House and Senate bills in committee with provisions to restore the tax deductibility of interest paid on student loans. Contact your congressmen; voice your support! Another college aid battle emerging between Clinton and GOP leaders is over the Department of Education’s new direct lending program. Clinton proposes that students attending a college participating in this program can bypass banks entirely and get loans from the federal government through the campus financial aid office. Benefits of the direct program include lower interest rates and more flexible repayment options, allowing borrowers to extend pay ment from 10 to 30 years. The new program’s most attractive fea ture may be its income contingent repay ment options, which allow students to tie their student loan payments directly to their income. The GOP believes that this plan only makes borrowing seem more affordable by lowering monthly payments. The American Association of State Col leges and Universities estimates that pay wisdom of your Friday-Saturday-Sunday ticket distribution scheme. I am a Senior. I am an angry Senior who is writing this letter as a cathartic measure to prevent me from venting my frustration with CAA policy (that I hold the co-presidents re sponsible for) in more ugly ways. The following list outlines my understanding of this weekend’s fiasco that has resulted in the fact that I will see my last home basket ball game as a student from section 205A rowS! 1) Friday 6 p.m. Seniors have been in formed that they must be present at this time in order to pick up ticket vouchers. (We learn Sat. that we had wasted our time. The vouchers mean nothing in rela tion to the quality of your ticket and addi tionally are made available on Sat. morn ing to anyone who hadn’t taken the time to pick up vouchers on Friday.) 2) Saturday 8 a.m. A random selection of names is announced and we begin to form lines of 100 to receive our “best tick ets that will be distributed at random to Seniors... no need to camp out” By my count I was one of the first2oo students to pick up a ticket and received upper-level seats. (As did the gentlemen in front of me (Section 205 A—What a coincidence in a “random” distribution!) and my best friend who walked up the hill about 3 groups later, Section2ls. I’m sure their memories of their Senior game will be almost as fond as mine (note: sarcasm). 3) Sunday. After camping out, two Freshman classmates of my frosh room mate (who is kicking himself for not going with them) were presented with lower level seats to the *Senior* game! I guess this must be more of the “fairness” that my CAA presidents wrote of in their Friday DTH column (“CAA Presidents Explain Why Ticket Dikribution Is Random”). 4) Monday. Walking down to the Dean Dome this morning, two freshmen procured a pair of tickets to Section 215 row L 7 rows closer to the game than myself. Hmmm, should I be angry? Rather than go on and on with what I suppose you will view as my “sour grapes” whining, I wish you would attempt to explain this issue to me in order to quench my fury. Failing this, as I anticipate you will, I insist that the CAA provide the Seniors of this school with a public apol ogy for failing horribly as elected officials and representatives of a proud and other wise competent institution. Asa final note, on Saturday morning a CAA official at tempted to placate me by explaining, “Well I’m sony but you actually had a better chance of getting good seats than we had Monday, February 20,1995 3. You assumed we’d know you were ready to graduate and you never stopped by Steele Building or Hanes Hafi early in your last semester to apply for graduation. 2. You never went to see your Arts and Sciences adviser and listened instead to what your friends told you (“But one ofmy friends said he was sure you could take extra courses in your major pass/faiL”) 1. You never took the swim test Joseph Lowman is a professor of psychology and assistant dean of the College of Arts and Sciences. ments for low- and middle-income bor rowers under income-contingent repay ment will be so low that an estimated 66 percent will incur negative amortization for at least one year, 24 percent for at least five. In other words, your payment is lower than your interest due. The difference is added back to your loan principal and taxed again. You lose, two ways. Now, back to our state problem, rapid increases in tuition, more borrowing and no consid eration for damaging national policies will further cut into student’s futures. Leading die state into the next century is, no doubt, a daunting tarfr The state constitution states that North Carolina pro vide free public education, “as far as prac ticaNe.” Practicable means feasible, useful and level-headed. The short-sighted disre spect for the teaching, research and service provided by tiie graduate students at Caro lina have left blood and pain on the future scholars of this state. Mr. Hunt, please remember, without graduate and profes sional students, we would not be tire Uni versity of North Carolina, just another college. Stave Hoffmann is the presidentelect of the Graduate and Professional Student Federation. originally expected. Since fewer Seniors are here this morning than we anticipated, you had a better chance to get lower-level seats.” Either this yellow-jacketed gentle man was a fool or assumed that I was. What “fewer Seniors than expected” meant is that because tickets had been random ized, more underclassmen would get seats (that’s OK) and be seated in lower-level seats (an outrage to those Seniors who will be bringing binoculars to the game). Now that I have informed you of where I have had my seat relegated, why don’t you make public where the CAA co-presi dents will be seated so that we may know where to direct our anger and protest (Til bet it is quite far from the rear 0f205A.) Dniim SENIOR POLITICAL SQENCE Duke PigtrMmtlos Slwrml Positive Improvement TO THE EDITOR: I am writing in response to tire letter to the editor by Michael Karenovich and Matthew Guma about Dook ticket distri bution and the CAA (“CAA Botched Dis tribution ofTickets for Duke Senior Game,” Feb. 15). lam tired of students bad mouth ing tiie CAA and its leadership. For the first time in the four yean that I have also braved the cold, I feel that the distribution was fair, making people play by the rules instead offinding ways to get around them. Every Dook distribution previously has pissed me off. I go a few hours earlier than the announced time, and there would al ready be a thousand people in line; tiie CAA breaking its own policy. This year, with the double-random system for the Wake and Clemson tickets that enforced the 6 p.m. time, was perfectly fair. I slept in the Dean Dome and still got crappy upper level seats. The point is that I had tiie chance to have front row. For the Dook game nobody spent more than several of hours in line, and everyone had the chance to have premier seats. The friend I was with was complaining about the CAA and that heads would roll if be got upper-level seats. He was unsurprisingly appeased when he got second-row seats and praising God. He deserves those seats no less than tiie pissed off Michael and Matthew, but they had the same, equal chances as all of us seniors, and for them, bad hide sucks. Keith La Torn SMOR ENVIRONMENTAL SOENCE 11