More
SUN-shine
predicted
this year
By Kathy Slepicka
The State University of Nebraska
(SUN) shone brightly last semester, and
the forecast for this year is "more of the
same."
New courses will begin in early March,
according to Milan Wall, SUN public
affairs director. He said announcement oi
what courses will be offered should be
made toward the end of the week (Jan.
20). V
He said the courses first must be
approved by the National Research
Advisory Council, advisory group tc
SUN's main financer, the National
Institute of Education (NIE).
Wall said next session's courses will
follow about the same format as the first
session's. Half-hour instructional
programs are shown twice weekly on the
Nebraska Educational Television Network
and a weekly supplement listing the
programs is run in the entertainment
section of the Sunday Omaha
World-Herald. Each course has a text
study guide, he added.
Toll-free number
SUN students , can contact their
teachers- by calling a special toll-free
number, Wall said. The special line not
only helps the student, but makes the
course more personal, according to Wall.
Learning centers are also available to
students, Wall said. At the centers,
students may review tapes of TV
broadcasts or seek advice on upcoming
SUN and other University of Nebraska
courses, he said. SUN learning centers are
in the Nebraska Center, "UNL east
campus; Kearney State College library,
Kearney; J.G. Elliott Building,
Scottsbluff, and in Omaha.
Reaction to the first SUN courses has
been positive, Wall said, although he said
some students criticized the TV
broadcasts as "too entertaining." He
estimated 400 students enrolled in
Accounting I and 270 students in
Introductory Psychology last semester.
Students are women, homemakers
Wall said SUN students' average age is
41, most are women, and 75 per cent of
those are homemakers. About half the
students have taken some college courses
before, he said. Geographical distribution
of students resembles the state's
population, he added, with about 50 per
cent from the Lincoln and Omaha areas.
Wall said the number of students
taking courses for credit hours (and a
grade) is surprising. He said 75 to 80 of
the students are registered for credit,
about 15 more than SUN officials
anticipated.
Noncredit rates could increase
This statistic may bring about one
change in SUN, he added. The current
SUN fee is $18 per credit hour, he noted,
with students paying half of that total.
Wall said he thought noncredit students
may be charged the same rate as credit
students next session because "they
receive all advantages credit students do."
Wall said week-long breaks may also be
added to next session's courses, since
many students said it was difficult for
them to keep up with their homework.
Increased prices will probably raise
course materials' cost from their present
$16, he added.
He noted SUN didn't reapply for a
grant from the Clark Foundation last
summer because the foundation assets
went down with the stock market. The
foundation did extend use of the
$200,000 one-year grant awarded SUN in
October 1973.
The lack of a new grant from the Clark
Foundation will have no serious effect on
the SUN project, he said.
Mental Services head:
Patient care deficient?
If the U.S. Supreme Court rules that persons committed to
mental institutions must receive treatment or be released, Nebraska
will have, difficulty providing that treatment, according to a state
Public Institutions Dept. official.
Dr. Franklin Master, acting director of Mental Services, said
there are too few psychiatrists serving the state's three mental
hospitals to provide the treatment the court might demand for
civilly committed patients.
The "right-to-treatment" issue probably will be before the high
court by June, according to an article in the Dec. 29, 1974 issue of
the Omaha World-Herald.
$38,000 in damages
Florida is appealing a case from the Fifth U.S. Circuit Court of
Appeals in New Orleans. The circuit court held that Kenneth
Donaldson, a Florida mental hospital patient for 14 years, is
entitled to $38,000 in damages from two hospital psychiatrists.
According to the World-Herald, Donaldson testified that he saw
a psychiatrist a total of three hours durfrig the first ten years of his
confinement. He said receiving inadequate treatment and not being
released from the mental hospital violated his constitutional rights.
700 patients
Master said Nebraska's three mental hospitals, at Lincoln,
Hastings and Norfolk, have a total of 700 patients. He said the
Donaldson case could force the Institutions Dept. to hire more
than the current eight psychiatrists for the s " r release many
of the patients, many of whom "really need to be there."
"The lawsuit says the court would not accept milieu therapy as
a substitute for direct doctor-patient visits," he said. In milieu
therapy , a doctor supervises a nursing staff, and the nurses treat the
patient. Master said this is done because of the high patient-doctor
ratio.
Masters said Nebraska's state hospital system will be "especially
vulnerable" in Lincoln, because there is one staff psychiatrist for
every 85 to 120 patients.
He said Nebraska has trouble attracting psychiatrists, because of
a low pay scale and the state's rural nature. Psychiatrists, he said,
usually prefer an urban area.
He said the state psychiatrists receive a starting annual wage of
$27,000 to $34,000. The amount depends on experience. He said
some state pay $10,000 to $15,000 more per year than Nebraska.
Personal liability
"The unfortunate thing with this lawsuit is the personal liability
of the psychiatrists," Master said. "The amount the doctors were
sued is more than a Nebraska psychiatrist makes in a year."
He said doctors working in Nebraska's lower pay scale might be
driven out of mental hospital work, knowing they could be
financially responsible for a patient's treatment. That treatment,
Master said, depends on how much money the Legislature provides.
"We're competing with all other service areas of the government
for the same tax dollar, and that tax dollar is shrinking," he said.
Some Lincoln complaints
Barbara Gaither, executive director of the Nebraska Civil
Liberties Union (NCLU), said the NCLU already has handled some
complaints by patients at the Lincoln Regional Center.
She said the most complaints came from sexual sociopaths who
"say they've been told outright that there is really no cure (for
them)."
Gaither said the mental institutions seern to think their only
role toward the mental patient is one of confinement. That would
change, she predicted, if the Donaldson case is decided in favor of
the mental patient.
Gaither said that if the Donaldson decision is affirmed by the
Supreme Court, alternatives to mental hospitals might be more
fully utilized.
monday, january 13, 1975
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daily nebraskan
page fifteen
