daily nebraskan
thursday, april 13, 1978
J
page 4
Grade standards: omens of entrance requirements?
The College of Business Admini
stration soon will be sending letters
to some business students that will
be less, eagerly received than tuition
statements.
Dean Gary Schwendimann said
that any major who entered the col
lege after June, 1977 and has a cum
ulative GPA below 2.0 will be given
until the end of the semester to raise
his GPA to a 2.5. If these students
don't make the grade, they will be
asked to transfer to another college.
Last year's warnings about CBA
curtailing enrollment have come
true. Due to a necessary budget ex
penditure cut for 1978-79 and the
lack of enough teachers and re
sources, CBA has had to draw the
line.
But CBA isn't the only UNL col
lege suffering from overcrowding.
Several UNL colleges - among
them Engineering, not to mention
numerous departments - are brac
ing themselves for a surplus of stu
dents next semester. And as a re
sult, students are going to have to
brace themselves for the colleges'
bracing efforts.
A vicious circle?
You bet, and that's exactly how
to describe the conditions that have
:reated the dilemma we are now fac
ing. There are simply too many stu
dents and not enough teachers and
resources to educate them.
This vicious circle began years
ago, when you and I most likely
were still struggling over that junior
high math course.
UNL budget increases could not -or
did not - keep up with the num
bers of new students enrolling each
semester. Unfortunately, this is a
fact which is best realized after it has
happened. Unfortunately this fact is
being realized.
Just this semester we have seen
the Department of Health, Physical
Education and Recreation require
letters of academic intent from stu
dents before allowing them into up
perclass courses.
CBA is drawing the line at a 2.5
GPA and holding fast to it.
The Engineering College is not go
ing to let incoming freshmen with
low ACT or SAT scores take any
courses within the ocllege until that
student has established a 2.0.
What to do about this madly
whirling circle? Where will it end?
Hopefully with a policy that will
allow UNL to be the center for learn
ing and knowledge that it is meant to
be.
These minimum standards that
have been cropping up at UNL the
past few months should tell us some
thing more than the obvious fact
that UNL budgets just aren't big
enough to handle the demand.
Maybe the time has come for UNL
to do something about the "non-college
material" students who are put
ting a drain on those students and
professors of serious academic
intent.
meetings held behind closed doors, curiousity rises
A closed meeting by any government
agency brings to mind the central ques
tion: Why? When such a meeting is held by
the student government, the curiousity in
tensifies. The ASUN Special Topics Committee
held such a meeting last Friday about the
current YAF-NUPIRG controversy.
I I M.
i. Kern. .
wolgomott
After hearing public testimony from
YAF and NUPIRG, the committee voted 4-4-0
to go into executive session to hear
possibly damaging testimony from Don
Macke, NUPIRG president.
Macke requested the committee hold
the closed session.
"It was a special request to the commit
tee," Macke said. "I had things I wanted to
say in private."
The meeting was closed under guidelines
established by the Council on Student Life.
The guidelines require that closing of the
meeting be approved by a majority vote
of the body holding the meeting (in this
case, the ASUN subcommittee) and that
the meeting deal with "personal problems
of any individual or group whose rights
may have been threatened by publicity."
ASUN president Ken Marienau ex
plained the reason for holding the execu
tive session:
"Don Macke had pertinent information
to be heard, for his own personal protec
tion he did not want to give testimony in
public session which might be damaging to
him if it was published."
Marienau said the private testimony will
aid the committee with their investigation.
'To put it very simply, when Don was
testifying in open session, he gave some
facts that were relevant, but did not make
anything like a charge or strong charge,"
Marienau said.
Marienau said he believed Macke had
provided stronger testimony in the private
session, although he was not at the private
meeting.
Macke said his private testimony dealt
with three speculative, circumstantial
points dealing with YAF's activities.
Macke said he discussed harm to a speci
fic NUPIRG program, targeting by the na
tional YAF organization and the motiva
tion by the YAF attack on NUPIRG. He
did not elaborate further.
Although this is the first time Marienau
could remember a closed session being held
by ASUN, he said similar action was consi
dered last year.
He also said he would not hesitate to
use closed meetings in the future if a closed
meeting is necessary to protect a person.
"The whole idea (of a closed meeting)
leaves a bad taste in people's mouths,"
Marienau said. "But you have to be able to
guard something from the press which
would have legal liability and be damaging
to other people's character."
An increased usage of private, closed
meetings by ASUN would be a major error
in that organization's efforts to increase its
credibility and services to the student
body.
The primary way students find out
about issues is through the press. Very few
non-members attend ASUN senate meet
ings, so any information filtered to the stu
dent body must come through the press.
Closing a meeting to the public in effect
prevents students from knowledge of their
government's actions.
ASUN cannot afford to develop the
image of being a closed society which oper
ates primarily behind closed doors. Investi
gations such as the current YAFNUPIRG
inquiry are a definite step forward for
ASUN. But even the U.S. Senate and
House eventually open their major investi
gations to the public, i.e. Watergate and the
Korean investigation.
ASUN should follow this precedent, as
complete public exposure of the facts
gathered in an investigation is necessary to
clear the air of innuendo and suspicion.
to the editor
There are a few misconceptions about
the Women's Resource Center which I
would like to clear up. First of all, the
reasons for banning the distribution of
the Gazette did not center around any
one's abortion stand, and I believe this has
been stated several times before. The rea
sons for the ban are :
1) the donations to the Gazette, collec
ted in a jar placed in the WRC, were being
ripped off;
2) a shortage of space in WRC;
3) and the bylaws of WRC state that
only material specifically related to
women's issues shall be distributed in the
center.
Secondly, the Women's Resource Center
is not pro-abortion, it is pro-choice, and
there is a difference.
If a woman comes into WRC and wants
information on any of these subjects, it is
given to her with no questions asked.
There is a wealth of information on a
variety of subjects of interest to women
and men in the WRC library and vertical
files.
WRC is a place where women and men
can go for support in dealing with many of
the hassles that face us all.
I've talked to the various people who
work there and I've looked through their
material, which is available to all. WRC is
open to all !
I am wondering where Sue Kouma
(Daily Webraskan, April 9) got her in forma
tion. Has she ever been to WRC? I suggest
that she and all others who share her mis
conceptions about the center talk to the
people who work there, go through their
material and find out what the Women's
Resource Center is all about!
Joni Martineau Day
Senior, Natural Resources major
Music, please
Has anyone on the Daily Nebraskan
staff ever considered reviewing something
other than television shows and current
movies? I am speaking in particular about
the many university-produced concerts and
recitals available every week from the
School of Music. Additionally, many
School of Music-sponsored guest artists,
many of world renown, appear at low or
no cost to students Yet these events war
rant no space in the Nebraskan other than
a small blurb on the day of the event, or
at most a place in the "Face the Music"
slot.
Perhaps a weekly review of some
School-sponsored concert would bring
knowledge of these fine events fo more
students and rectify this apathy.
Steve Wengel
Freshman, pre-med major
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