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Thursday, November 15, 2001
Opinion
<2H|e Mg (Bar Urd
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Katie Hunter
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Student Government Needs to Speak Out on Students' Behalf
Students are set to become
UNC’s overlooked con
stituency unless some
thing changes - soon.
It now has been almost two
years since a student govern
ment leader has stood up pub
licly to the folks in South
Building over a major campus
issue.
And administrators are get
ting used to expecting dispas
sion and complacency from
the student government leaders charged
with the task of bringing student concerns
to the table.
If things do not change, pretty soon no
undergraduate on this campus will
remember that student leaders once con
sidered themselves legitimate sources of
power at UNC.
And some key administrators and
trustees would be just fine with that.
Do you realize that in March of 1966,
12 students, led by Student Body
President Paul Dickson 111, filed a lawsuit
against top University administrators who
refused to allow two prominent
Communists give speeches on campus?
Just two years ago, a student govem-
Board Editorials
Closing the Chapter
The agreement between the United States and Russia to reduce nuclear arms sets a positive example for the world
Even though Monday’s tragic plane
crash darkened the beginning of the week,
there have been several breakthroughs in
our nation’s current international situation.
The Northern Alliance took over Kabul
in hopes of fully eradicating the Taliban
regime in Afghanistan, a major step in the
fight against terrorism.
The federal government has made great
strides in improving bioterrorism prepara
tion plans throughout the country in a rel
atively short time period of time.
And on Tuesday, amid the drawn-out
debates and arguments surrounding missile
defense, President Bush and Russian
President Vladimir Putin agreed to reduce
Cold War-era nuclear arsenals by as much
as two-thirds. The announcement was
made at a joint press conference on the first
of a three-day summit between the two
leaders.
This reduction will be a major step fqr
ward in bettering post-Cold War- relations
with a once-bitter rival. It is imperative dur
Constructive Criticism
The University needs to better inform campus residents about inconveniences related to construction projects
Hark the sound, Carolina.
Hark the sound, that is, of the new
Carolina; grow accustomed to waking to
the sounds of jackhammers, backhoes and
construction workers yelling
out orders to each other in the
wee hours of morning.
For many students living in
residence halls that have
become construction sites, the length of the
projects comes as somewhat of a surprise.
Not only are the projects going on for
much longer than planned, but the
University did a poor job informing resi
dents about projects and their timelines.
If students could have known in advance
that they would be paying to live in a resi
dence hall where backhoes started digging
every day at 7 a.m. or where there was peri
odically no hot water, then many probably
would have looked into living off campus.
However, the projects go beyond con
struction around residence halls.
KATIE HUNTER
EDITOR
ment-led fight against the wish
es of the Board of Trustees
helped get a proposed five-year
tuition increase knocked down
to only two years.
Both scenarios are examples
of strong student leadership.
I can’t imagine our current
student leaders having the
gumption to act similarly.
I recently heard a former
chancellor describe the essence
of strong leadership as the abil-
ity to identify a set of values and to stand
up for those values, whatever the cost.
Recent events have prompted me to
wonder whether current student govern
ment leaders have abandoned their val
ues, or worse yet, if they ever really
stopped to think about what those values
were to begin with.
In the leadership sense, having values
means having vision - knowing the dif
ference between those issues that ulti
mately are inconsequential (whether the
student body president gets a stipend)
and important long-range issues that are
essential to the future of the University
(free speech on campus, tuition).
Since August, three major issues have
ing this critical time that attempts are made
to maintain good foreign policy with Russia
and all over the world.
America has a nuclear arsenal of around
10,000 warheads, with Russia possessing
some 7,000. Bush and Putin agreed to cut
the number of nuclear weapons to some
where between 1,700 and 2,200 for both
countries over the next decade. An agree
ment between both leaders provides a pos
itive example of improved American-
Russian relations.
An arms reduction represents a good
move in creating new national security
measures. For 50 years national security
was defined by intense periods of nuclear
deterrence.
The government inadvertently played
shadow games with Russia using under
cover intelligence to better homeland secu
rity. An arms reduction shows that both
nations are trying to avoid deterrence secu
rity to maintain democratic ideals. Security
is based on the general will of a society and
Officials at the Student Union
announced recently that construction of the
new wing is two months behind schedule.
The new building was set for completion
last June and is now on sched
ule to be finished sometime in
February.
Among the reasons for the
delay is the fact that the stairs
Matt Minchew
Editorial Notebook
connecting the area by Student Stores and
the Union with South Road weren’t straight
and consequently will have to be
destroyed.
It’s understandable that there are a lot of
construction projects the University will
have to undergo for some time.
Still, it seems that the number of projects
going on simultaneously makes deadlines
harder to meet. Maybe the University has
bitten off more than it can chew. A project
to replace the water heating system just out
side Mangum and Ruffin residence halls
also has been further delayed.
come up that have the potential to drasti
cally alter the direction in which the
University moves in coming years.
These issues are tuition, student parking
and the question of whether UNC will
establish a satellite business school in Qatar.
Student concerns have been virtually
unrepresented as of yet on all three topics.
Now the blame cannot be placed on
students alone (Lord knows, there is little,
if any, evidence to suggest that adminis
trators - namely Chancellor James
Moeser - are at all concerned with stu
dents’ opinions on University issues).
But I think it is irresponsible for students
to fail to ask their elected student govern
ment representatives why student govern
ment has not made a bigger stink about
foutinely being ignored.
Perhaps the most blatant example is
the parking issue. Administrators recently
announced that all on-campus parking
spaces for students who live on campus
will be eliminated in the near future.
Input from the two students who sit on
the Transportation and Parking Advisory
Committee was never solicited in the deci
sion. But what is even more shocking is the
sedated student government response.
Although leaders have said they are disap
its people, not on stockpiles of lethal
weapons.
Furthermore, this agreement provides an
example for the rest of the “nuclear world.”
In an age where potential conflict looms
heavy on the hearts of many worried citi
zens in “nuclear nations,” this relationship
displays successful diplomacy defined by
open communication and compromise.
The United States cannot let nuclear
weapons affect important political decisions
with nations such as China, Pakistan and
India.
The agreement goes a long way in clos
ing the book on Russia and America’s
nuclear rivalry.
Russia and the United States have the
chance to strengthen a strategic relationship
that was once thought to be impossible by
many critics.
The arms reduction agreement is just
one aspect of Bush and Putin’s overall goal
to accomplish sound diplomacy and prove
that theory wrong.
Residents in these halls were recently
without hot water for several days, and
oftentimes the hot water is shut off unan
nounced from time to time.
In addition to the e-mails that resident
assistants send out to their residents, the
University housing department needs to
take a more active role in keeping residents
informed. It simply isn’t fair that many res
idents unexpectedly find themselves living
in the middle of a huge construction site,
walking in between heavy machinery just
to get to their front door.
Unfortunately this is the reality of living
on campus at a university that is growing at
a rate that, apparently, it can’t handle.
So get used to it, Carolina. New projects
keep springing up as old ones remain unfin
ished or delayed. Maybe in 50 years, when
the Master Plan is finished and all that is
left of Chapel Hill is UNC, people will be
able to find some peace and quiet on cam
pus.
pointed with the decision, no large-scale
action has been taken to mobilize student
opposition on one of the few issues stu
dents on this campus genuinely care about.
Similarly, on the issue of Qatar, it shocks
me that student government is not publicly
outraged by the fact that Student Body
Presidentjustin Young -a voting member
of the BOT who legally is afforded the
same rights as every other BOT member -
was told he could not participate in a recent
trip to the Middle Eastern nation.
Although UNC students might never
attend classes at the satellite campus, it
still seems as though they should have
some input about whether their business
school professors are shipped to the other
side of the world to teach Qatari students
instead of UNC students.
Student Body Vice President Rudy
Kleysteuber said Wednesday that he
believes any trustee other than Young
would have been allowed to go to Qatar.
But what concerns me more is that
Kleysteuber also admitted that student gov
ernment did not think it wise to exacerbate
an already “tense” relationship between
student government and Moeser and there
fore setded for Wednesday’s forum as an
adequate way to gauge student input
The Guilty
Pleasures of
Harry Potter
Friday the 16th, is not merely the middle of November
or the beginning of another weekend or the day
before the Duke/Carolina football game. Tomorrow is
the day that the first Harry Potter movie opens nationwide.
Laugh if you will, but for a lot of college students and
adults, this pre-adolescent boy and his adventures have
reeled them in. I even know one member of Phi Beta
Kappa, who will remain nameless,
who owns a pair of Harry Potter
socks.
At first, it seems silly to enjoy
young adult books so much, but after
reading them, it doesn’t take too long
to see the pull.
On one hand, the books simply
provide entertaining fiction written in
an engaging, easy-to-read style. The
characters also tend to be quirky in an
endearing sort of way.
Harry Potter’s friend Hermione has poofy hair and
spends most of her time studying, but she goes along with
most of Harry’s schemes, usually has a solution for unexpect
ed problems and, to the dismay of the other female students,
wins the heart of a handsome visiting student. Hagrid, the
gamekeeper at the school, looks fearsome but cries easily
and tames giant spiders and other unusual creatures.
In each book, Harry and his friends also solve a mystery
with many twists and bumps along the way.
Beyond interesting plots and characters, though, these
books simply offer a world of fantasy and imagination.
People can wear invisibility cloaks and walk around with
out anyone seeing them, look at a school map with moving
figures for all of the people on the grounds or make potions
that will allow them to temporarily switch bodies with
other people.
Especially in today’s fast-paced world, we don’t often get
to let our thoughts drift to implausible situations. We have
been taught to question ideas and challenge what we see.
Our professors instruct us to back up our positions, re
examine beliefs we’ve always held, and understand why
theories hold true.
We’ve been trained to see life as it stands - to notice the
way the people around us look and behave, read the news
paper and follow current events, and make judgments
based on facts. We rarely spend our days wondering about
things that could never exist or simply doing something
unstructured. Even time spent with friends often becomes
ordered. We plan ahead of time to go to a party, play bas
ketball or watch a movie. And, for the most part, we know
what the event will entail.
Although people sometimes encourage us to “think out
side the box,” they very rarely do so for the sake of imagi
nation itself. Professors might tell us to follow our crazy
ideas or to write a first draft using as little of our conscious
minds and rational thoughts as possible.
However, professors do not give this advice to provide
personal entertainment or to make us more interesting peo
ple. They simply believe that these tactics will enable stu
dents to produce better work.
In the same way, the bosses of large companies might
ask employees in a brainstorming session to give them their
most ridiculous and unlikely ideas, not to add depth to
individual lives but to encourage creative solutions for their
businesses.
I can certainly see the point of rationality. If no one
thought to set standards for employees or remembered to
pay bills, our society couldn’t function. We wouldn’t have
accurate medical research, dependable cars or computers
or even running water. However, even if practical thinking
accomplishes important business, the fact remains that
many of us spend our days operating rationally and aiming
for efficiency.
And, this favoring of precision makes it easy for us to
have underdeveloped imaginations.
What we think about when we stop filtering our thoughts
doesn’t even matter so much. Just daydreaming about any
thing offers relaxation, lets unconscious thoughts surface
and returns us to our regular lives and ways of thinking
feeling refreshed.
Therefore, simply by sitting and doing nothing but mus
ing, we can improve our outlook on life or even become
more productive in our work. We aren’t often asked to
think like a kid who’s told to believe that a fairy takes away
his baby teeth, that a giant bunny brings him candy each
spring or that a world could exist where boys fly on broom
sticks or put spells on cars to make them fly. But, on those
rare occasions when someone invites us to make believe, it
almost makes logical sense to do it.
Marian Crotty can be reached at mcrotty@email.unc.edu.
Unfortunately, student government
and the Campus Y allowed the forum to
present just one side of the issue to stu
dents. Not one of the five panelists was
opposed to the satellite campus.
And on the issue of tuition - perhaps
the issue that is the most germane to stu
dents at this University - student govern
ment officials again have yet to take a
firm stance on a tuition increase that -
when you take away the smoke and mir
rors - everyone knows the BOT will act
on in January.
Today the trustees are slated to hear
how UNC’s tuition compares to similar
schools’ and are expected to set up the
committee that would draft a tuition pro
posal. It will be interesting to see how
student government representatives
approach the meeting, the outcome of
which could gready affect students.
It is time for student government rep
resentatives - namely Young - to display
strong leadership and strong values.
It is time for student government to
take a public stand for students - whatev
er the cost.
DTH Editor Katie Hunter can be
reached at krhunter@email.unc.edu.
(Flip Daily (Far MM
MARIAN CROTTY
COUNTERPOINT
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aMB
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