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Jeff Robb.
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Daily
Nebraskan
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University of Nebraska-Lincoln
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Hard time
More executions drawback of plan
Three strikes — you’re in.
That’s one of the main goals of Gov. Ben Nelson’s crime package,
revealed Wednesday at the Capitol.
Among other things, Nelson would keep repeat criminals from the
possibility of parole — three strikes and you’re in. That’s just one of
the good things about the package.
The governor’s plan would also provide additional funding for
juvenile justice, expanding on a crime bill that the Legislature passed
last year.
As a whole, the package is very characteristic of the get-tough-on
crime initiatives that Nelson has proposed in the past. Few people
would argue with the more money for law-enforcement equipment, or
the heavier sentences for violent and dangerous criminals, or the boot
camps for nonviolent young-adult offenders, that the governor’s crime
package would create.
However, the package has its drawbacks.
Some of the other provisions in Nelson’s package would increase
executions in Nebraska. Nelson proposes the creation of a constitu
tional amendment that would give him sole authority over capital-case
pardons, and would require the Nebraska Supreme Court to expedite
its decisions on capital-offense appeals.
Nebraska needs tougher crime laws, but not more executions. The
Legislature should thoroughly examine Nelson’s proposals and pass
only those that will help the people of this state.
Another view
Early this year Douglas County will be part of a tri-county effort
to provide medical services for low-income residents with HIV.
The federally funded program will include free screening of blood
cell counts and various illnesses and referrals to about 20 doctors in
the area. The service will not turn away those patients who are taking
experimental drugs.
These 20 doctors should be commended for helping. They will
hardly make a profit from this — they will be reimbursed by the
government up to $600 annually for each patient they treat.
And while their efforts form a positive step, these doctors’ work is
hardly enough. Free testing by area health centers should be made
available once a month.
Patients will not seek medical relief from HIV unless they know
they have it. And sometimes even the $19 fee charged at Watkins
Memorial Health Center is too costly for those who are worried they
may have contracted HTV.
Instead, many who are infected may go through life as before, and
possibly infect others with the fatal disease.
Condoms aren’t a catch-all solution to the AIDS crisis, either. A
failure rate for pregnancy does exist with condoms, and viruses are far
smaller than sperm.
For these reasons, area health centers should provide free AIDS
testing at least once a month. The cost of extra tests are far less than
extra lives that rot away for years because of AIDS.
Already, nearly 800 people in Kansas have died from the deadly
disease.
And there is no accurate way to know how many people are infected
with HTV unless we offer free testing.
— University Daily Kansan
University of Kansas
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Profs: shape up or ship out
Traditional teaching methods
abound in our supposedly liberal
university.
As an education major, it has
become obvious that although
many of the professors who have
taught my classes may be the
foremost authorities in their areas
of expertise, they don’t know the
first thing about how to teach.
It is commonly thought that if
someone is knowledgeable about a
subject, then that person also
knows the best ways to present it to
students.
I have had way too many classes
where the instructor has just stood
up at the front of the room and
droned on about a topic for an hour
or two or three, or often the whole
damn semester.
Then, after the students have
absorbed the material the best that
they can, they are expected to
regurgitate it on mindless scantron
tests, or if they are lucky, in a
limited essay.
Too many egotistical professors
feel that they are some fountain of
knowledge that pours vast under
standing into the empty vessels of
students’ minds.
Unfortunately, real learning
doesn’t happen this way. Even
more unfortunately, very few
people realize this.
Oh yeah, it is possible to learn
from repetitive reading of notes and
textbooks. As most students know,
you can learn the material for about
a day or two, which is all you need
to pass the test.
But if students are questioned on
a subject they studied the semester
before, they usually say something
like, “Macroeconomics? I had that
last year. It means, like, bigger
Joel Strauch
than microeconomics.”
True learning and retention of
learning involves tying the new
stuff to stuff that the student
already knows, and getting the
students directly intricated into the
teaching/leaming process.
A teacher has to make the
material meaningful, present it in a
meaningful way and make the
material belong to the students.
Yeah, I know that’s vague, but
I’m not here to teach professors
how to teach (although I could
probably learn quite a few of ‘em
somethin’ or ‘nother). I’m just here
to let them know there might be
something wrong with how they’re
teaching.
I have come up with a checklist
that professors can use to assess what
the hell they’re doing (and that
students can use to assess what the
hell, if anything, they’re learning).
Check it out:
1) If the majority of your
students are using your class as
naptime or regularly threatening
suicide, something’s amiss. Either
pass out amphetamines at the
beginning of class, or try discussion
and an assortment of activities to
alleviate the horrendous boredom
of monotonous lectures.
2) If none of your students get
an ‘A’ or most of them are doing
below average, it might be time to
look at your evaluation methods. If
you are using tests that ask straight
knowledge questions like “What
was the birthdate and bra size of
John Wilkes Booth’s mother?”
you’re not doing anyone a favor.
3) If students become crossword
puzzle experts or write letters to
every relative except Aunt Bertha
during class, you’re not getting
them involved enough, learning is
dependent upon ownership of the
material, not limited rental.
4) If you are teaching the same
way you did last semester and the
semester before that, etc., slap
yourself! Classes change, students
change and hopefully professors
change. The teaching process must
be a constantly evolving one, or the
class will grow stagnant and wither
away like a marijuana plant in a
churchyard.
5) If you think you are a really
good teacher, but you can’t defend
your methods of instruction, you
probably suck as an instructor. This
isn’t your fault, but you need to
take steps to improve yourself.
These are just a sampling of the
myriad problems that professors
might face if they are trapped in the
traditional teaching rut.
I don’t pretend to be a perfect
teacher (although I am awfully
good), and I know that I have a lot
to learn.
Teachers need to be constantly
learning new ways to think and to
instruct. When you think that you
have nothing left to learn, you
probably know nothing about
learning.
Strauch is a senior secondary education
major and a Daily Nebraskan senior reporter.
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