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Numbers
University of Nebraska-Lincoln
July 3, 1980
lanning committee proposes program cuts
By Jeanne Mohatt
UNL's academic planning committee
voted June 25 to recommend to the chan
cellor's office the elimination of UNL's
Centennial College and UNO's general
engineering program, said Norma Sue
Griffin, the committee's chairperson.
Centennial College Senior Fellow Rob
ert Fuller said Tuesday he is appealing
the decision, and hopes the committee
will reconsider.
Lyle Young, acting dean of the College
of Engineering and Technology, would
not comment on the decision.
The Board of Regents Planning Sub
committee proposed the elimination of
both programs in May. Ned Hedges, vice
chancellor for academic affairs, received
the academic planning committee's
recommendations Tuesday, and will
make his recommendation to Chancellor
Roy Young in about two weeks, he said.
Young will then present his proposal to
the regents at their July 26 meeting, and
the regents will make the final decision.
Griffin said, "The vote of the commit
tee was to phase out both programs."
The vote to recommend termination of
UNO's engineering program was unani
mous, while a majority voted to termi
nate Centennial College, she said.
"Intense discussion related to both
proposals" took place before the vote, she
said.
Alternative proposals also were con
sidered, but were rejected because "they
would create so many problems. It would
mean the end of the programs anyway,"
she said.
Fuller said he intends to file an appeal
and also get students and faculty to show
support for Centennial College, an inter
disiplinary program for outstanding un
dergraduate students.
"Several long-term supporters of Cen
tennial College were out of town when
the vote was taken," Fuller said."Stu
dents didn't get a chance to have input
on the vote."
Scott Kaup, the Associated Students
of the University of Nebraska's represen
tative on the committee, is working in
Norfolk for the surrimer.
ASUN President Renee Wessels said
Tuesday she will appoint someone to
take Kaup's place at the meetings for the
remainder of the summer.
Fuller said Centennial College has
been appropriated $135,000 for this year,
but Hedges said he estimated the savings
from the elimination of Centennial at
$80,000.
' Hedges said the money saved by elimi
nating Centennial College will be specifi
cally designated to another area. He said
he has yet to recommend to Young the
budget priorities for the coming year, but
libraries will rank high on the priority
list.
He said 'no inherent conflict of inter
est" exists, even though the director of li
braries, Gerald Rudolph, is a member of
the academic planning committee.
"Gerald represents the perspectives of
the deans," he said, not the libraries.
Fuller said 13 people are on the aca
demic planning committee this summer,
but only seven people were at the meet
ing June 25. Hedges made the seventh
person and he did not stay to vote.
Griffin said the committee did have a
quorum and Hedges confirmed that.
Hedges said that if he decides to rec
ommend to Young the elimination of
Centennial College, he also must decide
whether to recommend that the college
be phased out over a period of two years
or discontinued after the coming year.
Fuller said that last spring the college
had the largest student credit hour prod
uction in its history.
The program's curriculum is made up
by faculty and students themselves. The
faculty are hired temporarily from the
various colleges on campus.
"The benefit of the program has been
completely overlooked," Fuller said, "and
the primary people to suffer are the students."
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Registration training begins
Training will begin next week to
prepare about 35 postal workers to
register 19-and-20-year-old men for
the draft by July 21, according to
Everett Strough, southeast Lincoln's
post office coordinator for draft reg
istration. Strough said about 135 southeast
Nebraska postal sta'tions, including
Lincoln stations, are preparing to
register the young men. He said that
no special hours or offices will be
made to accommodate those regis
tering for the draft.
Congress approved June 30, $13.3
million to finance militaryregistra
tion of about 4 million 19-and-20-year-old
men at post offices through
out the country.
The first peacetime military regis
tration since 1975 will require two
weeks, with men born in 1960 regis
tering during the first week and
those born in 1961 registering the
second week.
Failure to register is a felony car
rying a maximum penalty of $10,000
and five years in prison.
Strough said the registration form
is short and will be stored and pro
cessed by Internal Revenue Service
computers, because the I.R.S. has
the largest government computer
services available.
Strough said that he is aware of
the potential for anti-draft registra
tion demonstrations, and said that
he will alert police if any trouble
develops.
The post office is supposed to be
reimbursed by the Selective Service
for any extra expense that might be
involved in registering the men, he
said.
"However," he said, "one govern
ment agency getting money from an
other government agency is like pull
ing teeth when there aren't any."
Staff Photo by Joseph Bernt
Art Monson, deputy director of the Governor's Special Grants office
NU faculty, students help GoL citizens
Editor's note: This is part one in a
three-part series on the Nebraska
University's program to assist
Grand Island tornado victims.
By Jeanne Mohatt
NU faculty and students with special
knowledge and skills are helping Grand
Island citizens rebuild their lives, homes
and businesses after tornadoes ripped
through that city June 3.
Evaluating crop damage, re-planning
neighborhoods, training building inspec
tors and explaining how to remove glass
from carpets are only a few of the ways
people from NU are helping Grand Is
land tornado victims.
Those departments involved in the
volunteer university program are the
Colleges of Home Economics, Architec-ture,-Business
Administration and Engi
neering and Technology, and the Insti
tute of Agriculture and Natural Re
sources. '
Nine areas identified
Alan T. Seagren, the program's coordi
nator, said he, Cecil Steward (Dean of
the' College of Architecture), and various
subcommittee chairpersons of the
mayor's emergency coordinating commit
tee identified nine areas in which NU can
provide help to Grand Island. Hie areas
are:
mediating between homeowners and
insurance companies;
training building inspectors and
providing a team of inspectors for build
ing proiects;
establishing a neighborhood advi
sory committee;
providing consumer protection in
formation; assisting small business operators in
financial planning;
determining federal assistance
available;
providing recreational activities;
studying the fiscal status of the city
government due to loss of revenues and
increased costs; s
and providing early-childhood, pre
school activities.
Seagren said the emergency coordinat
ing committee asks him for names of peo
ple who are knowledgeable in these areas.
Seagren then refers the requests for aid
to the appropriate university depart
ments. The deans and directors of the de
partments locate faculty and students
with the needed special knowledge, and
Seagren gives the names of these individ
uals to the committee. The committe
then contacts the individuals.
Seagren said the committee's first re
quest for aid came in the area of architec
ture. "Faculty and students went to Grand
Island and worked with the city engineer
(Richard Ellston) and assisted in the ini
tial go around of appraising homes and
buildings," he said.
"We were not there to impose our
views or to tell them (city officials) what
to do," he said.
The general guidelines also require
that NU does not compete with services
for which other individuals and organiza
tions would normallly be paid.
The Hall County extension office, a
part of the cooperative extension service
of the Institute of Agriculture and Natu
ral Resources, has provided information
on how people should care for storm
damaged trees. v
The College of Home Economics arid
Kathy Parrott, state extension specialist
in housing and interior design, have
provided material to Grand Island citi
zens explaining how to clean clothes, pre
serve food, remove glass form carpet, and
watch out for consumer rip-offs.
The primary area of concern for
Grand Island's government now, Seagren
said, is the loss of revenue from electric
utilities. The money normally coming in
from people using electricity is no longer
coming in. The city is still rebuilding
power lines.
Don Pursell, bureau of business re
search director, has met with the mayor's
financial advisory committee. The bu
reau will do a study to project what the
city's revenue losses will be, and explain
alternatives.
Grand Island will receive 75 percent of
its disaster relief money from the federal
government and the state may provide
the other 25 percent. Gov. Charles Thone
said Grand Island may have to pahalf
of the 25 percent, but no final decison has
been made.
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Staff Photo by Jontt Hammer
Al Seagren, Grand Island