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friday, april 14, 1979
lincoirr, nebraska vol. 95, no. 96
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Tiptoeing . . . Sheldon sculpture watches as the Arts and Sciences faculty deliberates
on group requirements.
CSL discusses
student fees
ASUN hasn't been as fiscally accountable
to the University community as have other
University student organizations, according
to a report presented Thursday to the
Council on Student Life (CSL) by its ad hoc
committee on student fees.
The report, prepared by students, faculty
and administrators, outlines a fiscal
procedure for ASUN and recommends that
its budget review committee be expanded to
include faculty and students in addition to
the current administration members.
ASUN President Bruce Beecher said he
isn't pleased with the report and objects to
faculty determining how ASUN student fees
are spent. The report was justified in saying
ASUN hasn't been accountable, but
proposals to correct that will be presented to
CSL, he said.
The student fee committee chaired by
Peter Gr Wirtz, coordinator for Student
Activities, was established last October to
investigate the. student fee issue. CSL
received the report but took no action
Thursday.
CSL chairman Franklin Eldridge,
associate dean of the College of Agriculture,
said Chancellor James Zumberge will wait
. for the CSL report before acting on his
proposal to form a student fee committee.
The committee recommended that
tuition payment and fees should be
combined in a single amount and referred to
as tuition. University publications, such as
the Campus Handbook, should then list all
the types of services provided from the
single tuition payment.
These would include instructional
programs, health center, ASUN, Daily
Nebraskan ., Nebraska Union and other
programs currently financed by student fees.
One person on the committee, student
CSL member Dave Rasmussen objected to
the recommendation. He said students want
to know how their money is spent. By not
listing specific amounts allocated for each
program the University is "putting students
more in the dark."
Appeal routes for students dissatisfied
with the use of tuition should be published
in University publications, the report said,
and a procedure for adding new programs to
those receiving allocations from tuition
should be established.
Before any new facilities are built on
campus which would increase the current
$14.50 assessed students for bonded
indebtedness, students should be involved in
the decision, continued the report.
The committee said the Nebraska Union
should be commended for its
"accountability system" and its budget
Turn to Page 2
A& S faculty
postpones action
by Michael (O.J.) Nelson
TKe faculty of the College of Arts and Sciences will meet next
Thursday to continue discussing possible changes in the college's
group requirements. The faculty discussed the changes for almost
two hours Thursday afternoon before recessing.
If passed, the changes will be the first major revision of the
college's degree requirements since the early 1950's.
The proposal before the faculty contains both a majority and
' minority report. The group could accept one of the two verbatim,
in amended form, or reject them both.
The report was prepnred by the Arts and Sciences Curriculum
Committee. Both the minority and majority report would change
the foreign language requirement. Currently, students must take
four semesters, of a foreign language. If the student has studied a
language in high school, he may take as little as one semester of
the language at the University.
Enacting the majority report would eliminate the language
requirement completely and instead require additional hours of
humanities. The minority proposal would offer the student a
three-way alternative.
He may "test out" of a language by passing a proficiency test
complete a nine hour block of courses in foreign language or
culture plus a course in applied theoretical linguistics; or
complete the fourth semester of a foreign language.
Both proposals call for elimination of the freshman English
requirement.
Eric Davies, assistant professor of botany, and spokesman for
the Curriculum Committee, said the committee believes a student
should "gain depth and breadth" while at the University.
However, he added, the committee also believed a student cannot
achieve that depth or breadth by taking only the 125 hours
needed to graduate.
He said-the committee tried "to define the areas of human
' endeavor."
According to Davies, the committee only found three such
areas: the humanities, social sciences, and mathematics and the
natural sciences. He said the committee did not recognize foreign
language as a special area and therefore did not distinguish it from
the others in the majority report.
Davies said a minority of the committee believed languages and
culture to be a separate area and included them as such.
Said Davies: "The areas are arbitrary. You can see them either
of the two ways. It all depends if you are a 'lumper' or a
'splitter.'"
Michael Meyer, professor of history, moved to amend the
majority report to include a requirement that students must
either pass the fourth semester of a foreign language or an
equivalent examination. .
Meyer said that by giving the students a greater latitude of
choice the faculty would "abdicate (its) responsibility for
formulating what we think is a liberal education."
He said the attempt to eliminate the requirement is "an
example of Nebraska's ethnocentricism."
'The student can learn of another culture by other ways than
studying the language," said Richard Boohar, associate professor
of zoology. "A student can get a feeling for a country through
studying its literature in translation or its art or music."
Phillip Crowl, professor of history, said he could not accept
the study of a foreign culture as a substitute for study of a
language. He said he did not study a foreign language in college
and said he wished he had.
Gail Butt, professor of art, said he favored retaining the
requirement. He warned the body that the ramifications of
dropping foreign languages will "shock" the faculty. He said the
faculty should keep the requirements in order to help prepare
students for graduate school.
A student member of the Arts and Sciences Advisory Board,
Tom Wiest, said the faculty should consider "what is best for the
students." He said students come to college with different goals
and many do not go on to post-graduate studies.
"You should consider alternatives that will fit all the
students," he said.
"What you are talking of doing is abandoning traditional
scholarly principles in the name of freedom," said Ivan Volgyes,
associate professor of political science, speaking against the
proposal. 'This is not freedom, ladies and gentlemen, this is
license."
Several faculty members complained that they did not have
enough time to study the proposal. The body then decided to
recess the meeting until next week.
Following the meeting, Howard Norland, professor of English
and co-author of the majority report said students should talk to
i their instructors about the prospective changes in the
requirements.