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Budget ax should cut fingers, toes not neck
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There is little to say about salary levels at NU
that has not already been said. Salaries are low,
so low that some faculty members are being
lured away to universities where the salaries, if
not the pastures, are greener.
That little has been done about salaries may
; be because the wrong people have been doing the
" talking. Faculty members have for too long let
the administration and an occasional Daily
Nebraskan editorial speak in their favor. It's time
they let the Legislature know they are more than
harmless lines in a budget that can be cut at will.
As if the governor and the fiscal staff weren't
enough, it seems some senators must also cross
the line from fiscal responsibility to educational
suicide. To hear Lincoln Sen. Harold Simpson
describe Nlfs Areas of Excellence program as
"just window dressing" is to hear, perhaps, the
first death knoll for quality education in this
state.
The Areas of Excellence program is a
well-conceived means of using a little money to
help a few departments make the big jump from
good to excellent. When the Legislature approved
the concept, it made a great leap forward. Now it
is trying to take two steps back.
If this week's Appropriations Committee
hearings on the NU budget have revealed
anything, it is that, when it comes to financing
education, the governor is bad and the legislative
fiscal analysts are worse.
Or maybe they just appear that way. The
governor has recommended a $71.6 million
budget for NU; the legislative fiscal staff is
seeking $74.3 million. Exon's budget proposal
is in a lump sum; the fiscal analysts have itemized
theirs.
The result is that Exon has the advantage of
cutting Nlfs $86.3 million request without
telling anyone who got cut-a move that is, if not
constitutional, at least clearly political.
The fiscal analysts, on the other hand, have
had to reveal where the ax fell: no $1.2 million
to improve general UNL professional staff
salaries, no $296,000 to bring the agriculture
faculty up to third in the Big 8, no $480,321 to
designate five new areas of excellence, no
$352,934 to bring UNO faculty into parity with
other Big 8 schools.
The ax, it seems, always falls right where it
hurts most.
The Appropriations Committee, during its
deliberations on NlTs budget, should treat
faculty salaries, the Areas of Excellence program
and the SUN program as virtually sacred
territory. The ax, when it falls, should hit
something besides vital nerves.
Wes Albers
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ASUN excercise in futility
Dear editor:
The Concerned Pro-life Constitution has "been ratified by
ASUN. We are now a recognized student organization.
Our group is based on the pro-life philosophy of a concern for
all life,, and its protection. We are drawn together by a common
concern for human beings and their welfare.
This group has been formed to take action for the sake of
people. We encourage student involvement.
The Concerned Pro-Life Students
Vending machine questions
Dear editor:
Subject: Nebraska Union vending machine policies.
questions privately. I would like to ask them publicly and ask for a
reply from the appropriate partyparties.
1. Why was the chocolate removed from the 10-cent machine in
the South Crib? Is it to force the chocolate drinkers to spend 25
cents in the Crib for almost the same size cup?
2. Why is he 10-cent coffee and tea vender set so that it gives
about two-thirds of a cup?
3. Since the Crib is closed Saturday and Sunday, why is there
no hot water outlet for tea drinkers who come here to study on
weekends? (There used to be, in years past.) Why is hot water 10
cents for a two-thirds cup (where the hot chocolate used to be)?
4. Why are cigarettes 55 cents in the South Crib machine?
One fact should be realized in considering the four questions:
the private, profit-making company that has machines in places like
Andrews and Oldfather sells full cups of coffee and chocolate for a
dime and cigarettes for fifty cents.
Why does a private company do these things for us better than
our own Nebraska Union? Whose decisions are nickle-and-diming
us out of more than the commercial company (name please)? Any
chance our (?) Union will match the competition in price and
service? Whose lethargy (or larceny) has allowed the machine to
only partially fill cups, despite numerous complaints? Why should
complaints have to be aired to the public forum as an alternative to
their being ignored?
Answer please.
Broke and Thirsty
page 4
It's time once again for the "exercise in
futility." Candidates have been selected.
Petitions have circulated. Students are preparing
to elect the "campus leaders" for the 1975-76
school term.
This year, as in the past, a number of assorted
people believe themselves capable of representing
the student body.
From the dreamer to the prankster,
everybody enters the race. The only thing these
people hold in common, besides . being
candidates, is that they are all wasting their time.
John, for one, is a starry-eyed idealist who
believes something can be done to improve the
sorry state of student government. At night, he
lies awake, dreaming about taking on the
administration and the regents.
He envisions the student body, under his
guidance, throwing off the yoke of oppression
and claiming their rights and powers.
"If only we try," he says, "we can make
student government effective and worthwhile."
Unfortunately, John's dreams fast become
nightmares. After being elected, he finds out
there is no such thing as "effective and
worthwhile" student government. Instead, John
spends his time at boring and worthless meetings,
deciding whether there are enough toilets in the
Nebraska Union.
Mary is running for the ASUN Senate because
she is popular. Her sorority friends have urged
her to enter the race. They admire and look up
to Mary. She knows something about
every thing-except student government.
Mary thinks it would look good on her record
if she were elected senator. If you ask her what a
senator is or does, she is hard-pressed for an
answer. Mary is probably better off if she stays at
home and does some knitting.
Steve is the jokester. He belings to one of the
many nonsensical parties that spring up at
election time. To Steve, the election is a farce
and nothing more.
Candidates such as Steve provide us with
daily nebraskan
laughs and entertainment. Thev turn a dull and
sterile election into a circus. The jokesters, if
they don't become too serious, are the most
credible candidates of all.
And after the election? Well, John becomes
disillusioned when he realizes his idealism will
never become reality. Thus, he stops attending
the senate meetings.
Mary improved her "record." As for the
senate, she's forgotten it. Nobody told her that
she would have to go to any meetings or do any
work.
be dreesen
And Steveif he did, by some miracle, get
elected-is unlikely to treat student government
any differently than he did before the election. A
farce it was and a farce it still is.
And so it goes every year. A few students
make it to the polls and elect one or more of the
above. Most of the students wisely stay home.
The non-voters, if they're not just lazy, realize
the worthlessness of it all. To them, it doesn't
make sense to elect somebody to do nothing.
And nothing is what the ASUN Senate usually
does.
So that nobody will think student government
is all that hopeless, there is one worthwhile thing
the senate is capable of doing.
At their next meeting, if they can get a
quorum, the senators should all resign. Disband
the senate and leave its trivial and drudging tasks
to the administration and the regents.
thursday, march 6, 1975