12
TUESDAY, JANUARY 24, 2006
BOARD EDITORIALS
WOLF AMONG SHEEP
The federal government s offer of more funding for low-income students
is admirable, but it foreshadows increasing federal control of education.
Wolves and the federal government are not
above using trickery the wolves wear
sheep skins while the feds carry financial
aid grants.
The U.S. House of Representatives soon is expect
ed to pass a package that will establish a grant for
low-income students who graduate from “a rigorous
secondary school program of study.”
And who, pray tell, will determine the rigor of
Americas public schools? None other than the U.S.
Department of Education.
The goals of this initiative are noble: encourag
ing students to take advanced classes in high school,
pushing local school systems to develop advanced
curricula and promoting studies in mathematics and
the sciences.
All are grand objectives that are not the business
of the federal government.
This is the first step in the federal government’s
move toward establishing national standards for
local school curricula.
With all the problems that education has in the
United States, a national school board is not and
STILL NOT WORKING
The elections bylaws in the Student Code could lead to some crazy
scenarios and Student Congress should clean up the Code ASAP.
Hypocrisy comes in many forms, but none of
them are as fearsome as that ogre known
simply as the Student Code.
To be more specific, the section of the Code that
governs endorsements of student candidates is
ridiculous beyond the feeble imaginings of a mere
mortal.
According to Title VI of the Student Code, an
endorsement by a student organization is fine, but
if they publicize it using any resources whatsoever
like fliers —then those count toward the expen
diture of candidates if the candidates know that an
endorsement is going to take place.
This presents a problem in that even the student
body president race limits spending to S4OO.
What exactly does that mean?
Well, let’s say that The Daily Tar Heel endorses
a candidate. Candidates cannot accept the material
aid without counting it as an expenditure that is,
unless they “make a strong effort to remove or nul
lify an expenditure that did not have his/her prior
consent.”
The poor candidate endorsed by the DTH would
have to figure out the market value of the space used
SOME LEAKY LOGIC
u.v; .
A storm is brewing if Chapel Hill thinks the University should pay for
stormwater runoff without demonstrating a valid reason for doing so.
Chapel Hill’s streets and streams might runneth
over, but that’s no reason for the University to
have to give the town money to take care of
stormwater.
Town officials apparently think the University
isn’t doing enough about runoff this is in spite of
UNC’s very own comprehensive, multimillion dollar
clean-up effort.
Town Manager Cal Horton recently sent a letter
to University officials asking UNC to help pay for the
town’s pollution, erosion and flooding programs.
Mayor Kevin Foy agrees that UNC should help
bear the financial burden of dealing with water that
runs from University land to town land.
But there is a hole in their reasoning: The
University already is doing plenty to address the
stormwater that originates on its land.
Not only did UNC recently get approved for a
National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System per
mit, which means it has proven to the state that it meets
a set of guidelines for stormwater management, but it
also is spending about $lO million on its stormwater
efforts, according to The (Durham) Herald-Sun.
To put that number in perspective, imagine the 50
EDITOR'S NOTE: The above editorials are the opinions solely of The Daily Tar Heel editorial board and were reached after open debate. The
board consists of six board members, the associate opinion editor, the opinion editor and the DTH editor. The 2005-06 DTH editor decided not
to vote on the board and not to write board editorials. Address concerns to Public Editor Ellizabeth Gregory at elizagre@email.unc.edu.
ffEADEES’ FORUM
University offers plenty of
opportunities for minorities
TO THE EDITOR:
Although I agree The Daily Tar
Heel erred by not covering the
Nikki Giovanni lecture in the news
paper format, I must disagree with
Ms. Barrera’s comments Monday
alleging that certain groups are
being overlooked.
It is alarming to hear these words
from the former co-chairwoman of
the Minority Affairs committee of
student government.
The mere fact that we have
an MLK celebration planning
committee and a nationally
renowned Office of Diversity and
Multicultural Affairs points to the
fact that this University does care
about minority issues.
In fact, UNC is one of the few
public, nonhistorically black uni
versities to grace Black Enterprise-
Day Star’s “Top 50 Colleges
and Universities for African
Americans” list.
In just four years at UNC, I’ve
heard MLK celebration keynote
speakers Cornel West, Johnetta
B. Cole, Ben Carson and Nikki
Giovanni, respectively.
As an added treat, students also
got the opportunity to hear Ernest
Green of the Little Rock Nine this
year.
Despite his contribution to
minorities in education, I noticed
ought not be the solution.
Offering the grants to low-income students is just
the carrot to bring the states closer to the stick of
great intrusion by Congress and the executive.
While the Congress cannot directly force stan
dards on the states, it can give incentives to par
ents to quietly slip the leash of government control
around their necks.
Whether from the top or the bottom, it is a gross
leap forward in how much say the federal govern
ment has in education —one without precedent.
Encouraging academic achievement in the math
and sciences is necessary but not by breaking the
founding principle of federalism.
And while financial aid is important, especially
for those from low-income families, it is not more
important than the right of local communities and
the states to determine what their children should
learn and when they leam it.
It is poor form of the federal government to over
step its bounds like this —and doing it by taking
advantage of those in need makes it worse.
But after all, that’s how wolves operate.
to promote them unless they collect the 21,000-plus
papers giving them the nod. Well, after the first copy,
our newspapers cost a quarter a pop putting a can
didate way over his or her spending cap.
So technically, SBP Seth Dearmin should have
been disqualified for exceeding his budget after his
endorsement last year.
That little exercise is just one thorny stench blos
som out of a whole bouquet of problems with how
the Code handles elections.
And when Speaker of Student Congress Luke Farley
introduced a bill to change the endorsement section of
the Code, it didn’t pass and had to be withdrawn.
Whether Farley’s bill would have fixed all of the
problems is a debate for Student Congress wonks,
but revisions need to be made quickly before election
season comes to an end.
Without changes all sorts of scenarios could come
about, and the last thing student politics need are
election laws allowing for an endorsement-free can
didate to go through the Student Supreme Court
for a coup. And we all know undermining and over
throwing student government is more an affair for
South Building than South Campus.
million Wendy’s chicken nuggets the money could
buy about 1,800 per student heaped in a tower
ing mountain of white meat on Polk Place.
By giving funds to the town on top of what it
spends on its own, the University would be paying
two times for every drop of stormwater. And because
increased costs inevitably get passed on to students,
we’d end up being stuck with the double bill.
The only exception would be students living off
campus, who would be hit up for the rare trifecta
twice through the University and once through
the town’s own stormwater tax.
It would be silly to think that absolutely no water
flows from University land to town land; UNC does,
after all, sit at the top of a hill from which the town
gets its name.
But some stormwater just as surely runs from
town land to University land, and it’s hard to believe
that the imbalance is so great that it requires addi
tional University money to set it right.
Until Chapel Hill can prove that stormwater from
UNC costs the town a significant amount of money,
its hope of wringing funds from the University should
remain nothing but a pipe dream.
few students of color in attendance
as I looked around a quarter-filled
Great Hall last Thursday.
Asa teenager, he was spat upon,
called numerous racial slurs and
escorted by the National Guard as
he integrated a high school.
Ironically enough, Players was
packed out that same night.
The true injustice on this cam
pus lies in educational apathy
among students. Everyday stu
dents remain silent as they watch
their peers fail out of school.
How are we going to blame the
University about not caring about
students when it seems as though
students don’t care about them
selves?
I would be lying if I said that
race relations were perfect on this
campus. However, I do recognize
that the University has provided a
framework for racial tolerance and
understanding.
The question is, “What are we as
students going to do with it?”
Jarrod Jenkins
Senior
Political Science
UNC's honor societies are
now accepting nominations
TO THE EDITOR:
The Order of the Golden Fleece,
the Order of the Grail-Valkyries,
the Order of the Old Well and
Opinion
the Frank Porter Graham Honor
Society would like to announce that
the 2006 nomination submission
forms and additional information
are currently available at www.unc.
edu/honoraries.
Please go to the before men
tioned Web site to view more infor
mation about the societies and the
nomination process.
Faculty, staff, alumni and both
undergraduate and graduate/pro
fessional students are eligible to
make and receive nominations.
Nominations are due by 4 p.m.
Feb. 10.
Please help recognize those who
have made a contribution to the
UNC community.
Dan Herman
Graduate Student
Biomedical Engineering
People should come out to
register for Unity meeting
TO THE EDITOR:
Registration has officially
opened for this year’s Southeastern
Regional Unity Conference, which
will take place from April 7-9 on
the UNC campus.
The Unity Conference is a yearly
event that brings together LGBTQ
and allied students, faculty and
community members from across
the Southeast.
We will meet to discuss and
FROM THE DAY’S NEWS
“I’m definitely in support of a tuition increase”
SETH DEARMIN, STUDENT BODY PRESIDENT
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COMMENTARY
No pageantry necessary in
reigniting feminist struggle
Jennifer Berry, doe-eyed,
svelte, pluckeid and pinched
and permed to perfection,
clutched her roses Saturday and
sent each tear forth into a choreo
graphed slalom down a flawless
cheek.
This, apparently, is our Miss
America, a college senior from
Oklahoma who ranks a fifth-grade
stint with eyeglasses among her
most traumatic memories. In the
past 50 years the pageant has
become a B-list pop culture fix
ture, surviving dismal ratings and
feminist rants with the impervious
cheer of a bejeweled cockroach.
But beneath the halfhearted
scholarship fund and the saccha
rine speeches lies the question of
what, exactly, is being celebrated.
Surely after subjugation begot suf
frage and internment blossomed
to independence, more is required
of us than a swimsuit and a smile.
The issue at hand, however, is
not who gets the crown or which
breed of homeless puppy she’s
planning on saving Berry’s
ability to balance five pounds of
rhinestones across her polished
scalp is not exactly a matter of
national concern. And consider
ing viewership of the pageant is
down to just more than 10 million
from 85 million in 1960, one can
hardly say that Miss America is
poisoning our youth.
Instead, the injustice exists on
the opposite side of the television
screen. Because beyond the prime
time flurry of sequined gowns, mil
lions of actual Miss Americas are
too tired to smile and wave. They
have bills, children, backaches and
cellulite. And no one has bothered
to crown them.
We forget among all the
women’s liberation rhetoric and
gender-specific salary squabbles
that the vast portion of those
efforts do not help or even apply
to the unsung foundation of the
American female population.
While matriarchal scholars
organize around the intersections
of gender and sexuality with other
systems of identity including race,
class and faith in a weekend of
workshops, speakers, performanc
es and social events.
This year’s theme is “An
Unorthodox Union: Connecting the
LGBTQ and Faith Communities.”
Registration is free for all UNC
students and $lO for all others and
includes admission to all events
including the opening dinner and
closing brunch.
We invite you to look over our
Web site at www.unc.edu/glbtsa/
unity for more information and for
easy online registration.
We also are still accepting work
shop proposals for the conference,
which can also be found on the
Web site.
See you at Unity 2006!
Sarah Carucci
Director
2006 Unity Conference
CORRECTION
Due to a reporting error,
Monday’s editorial, “What’s in a
name?” misstates that an alternative
name considered for Carrboro High
School was West Chapel Hill High
School. The actual alternative was
South Chapel Hill High School.
The Daily Tar Heel apologizes
for the error.
KEEP 'EM ON THEIR TOES
squabble over the finer points of
feminist theory and varnished
careerists claw toward board
room chairs, far too many women
struggle to be merely women,
watching societal respect fade in
the absence of tangible accolades.
Because this soaring modem
image of the American woman
whether she is weeping over her
diamonds and roses or scream
ing at her Brooks Brothers-clad
underlings leaves little room
for reality.
The television seethes with
glamour, the newspapers bel
low with progress but the subtle
grace beneath the clamor remains
constant. American women are
still, in vast and steady numbers,
wives, mothers, homemakers and
caretakers. And in the steely eyes
of a freshly wrought feminist fan
tasy world, that invites guilt and
derision.
Somewhere along the line, it
even began to provoke a covert
punishment Women reliant on
welfare or Aid to Families with
Dependent Children often stay
that way, bound between the Scylla
of pittance pay and the Charybdis
of expensive childcare. Maternity
leaves offer just enough time for a
new mother to become thoroughly
exhausted before returning to
work, lest she be demoted to the
detested title of “homemaker.”
And so we, as a mottled emer
gence of sundry Miss Americas,
need to work on our ratings.
The point at which voluntary
childbearing and homemaking
became second-class occupations
was not a success for feminism
Speak Out
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Slip Saiig fotr Iteri
By Philip McFee, pip@email.unc.edu
but a failure to society.
We cannot expect America’s
daughters to wear crowns, win
titles, earn promotions and
demand six-figure salaries when
their mothers were derided for
simply being mothers. And per
haps a societal atmosphere that
brands biological imperative as
a worst-case scenario is as hypo
critical as it is harmful.
The beauty pageant scholar
ships and the fiery dissertations
could thus use a little deflec
tion. Nonprofit organizations
that focus on providing low-cost
childcare for welfare-dependent
women on job searches are strug
gling while programs aimed at
molding America’s next great
female leader flourish, building
towers without foundations.
No American woman not
Jennifer Berry or Madeleine
Albright, not Cindy Crawford
or Gloria Steinem is liber
ated until all of us have the basic
freedom and ability to choose our
own paths without judgment,
chipping our own names, no mat
ter how small, into the unyield
ing clay. And whether that path
involves ultrasounds and baking
ovens or crowns and corporate
mergers is of little consequence.
For too long we have been tell
ing the young women sitting rapt
before a Miss America telecast or
a CNN broadcast that to flourish
in adulthood they must avoid the
pitfalls of tradition, casting aside
the familial and the familiar. Yet
that is every bit as crippling as
denied suffrage and gender bias.
Oppression remains constant
no matter how malleable its mask
might be. That our hands are tied
this time with sequined fabric,
trembling around rose stems and
waiting for a commercial break, is
hardly a comfort in the end.
Contact Sara Boatright,
a junior public relations major,
at scb4l9@email.unc.edu.
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