Opinion
Don’t stop
the presses
College newspaper not
public relations tool
Protest is a healthy thing.
Students at Peru State College are making their voices
heard after the school newspaper’s adviser was forced out ear
lier this month.
The staff of the newspaper chose to black out its April 14
front page to protest what the students feel was the unjust dis
missal of their adviser.
But Peru State Times Editor in Chief Kathy Chase said the
firing was just another example of the animosity between the
administration and the newspaper this year.
“(The administration) is so forward looking that they're
stomping on the people here now,” Chase said of the ongoing
efforts to improve the college.
Last spring the Legislature
... it SeClllS debated closing the school but
p decided against it. Now it seems
reim peru administrators are trying to
administrators prove their school worthy.
But they don t seem willing to
are trying to deal with a free and critical student
j . press.
prove their That is a mistake.
school worth. A I’frous an? resP°nsib!e
press helps guarantee everyone s
freedoms.
Chase said that throughout her year as editor, administra
tors told her she should publish more positive stories about the
college. In one case. Chase said administrators tried to censor
an article.
Matt Mauch, the Times’ adviser, taught writing and jour
nalism classes as well as working with the student newspaper
staff.
Chase said Mauch was censored when he tried to criticize
a new school policy on a faculty listserve this spring, and
administrators had told Mauch he should be telling the news
paper what to print*.
The only explanation administrators offered after Mauch s
contract was not extended was that he didn’t fit in at Peru.
Mauch got the message and is looking for jobs elsewhere,
but Peru students are worried about their administration's pri
orities.
“It’s not really about getting (Mauch’s) job back as much
as it is about being really loud about what’s going on here,”
Chase said.
The student press never should be reduced to an extension
of the university public relations office.
Peru State already has a PR newspaper. If administrators
want more positive news, they can publish it there.
It is the student press’ responsibility to cover issues of
importance and interest to students. It is not their job to make
the school look good.
Editorial Board
Josh Funk (editor) • J.J. Harde • Cliff Hicks • Samuel
McKewon • Dane Stickney • Kimberly Sweet • Lindsay
Young
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Obermeyer’s
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Letters to the
EDITOR
Nine is fine
1 feel the statement made in yes
terday’s editorial that, “Attacking
Title IX, at least in this respect, is
sexist and wrong. Women's sports
make an easier target,” is incorrect.
By “attacking” Title IX, the
wrestling community is not attack
ing women’s sports at all.
You are right when you suggest
that Title IX is not the culprit,
though. It's the way Title IX is being
used. Title IX was meant to add
women’s sports to college campuses,
but instead it has been taking away
sports for men. A majority of the
wrestling community does not want
to abolish Title IX. We simply want it
to be rewritten to have it do what it
was meant to do, add women’s
sports.
I have had a lot of females write
me letters stating they are sorry for
the number of male sports teams that
have been thrown out because of
Title IX. They agree that Title IX
needs to be refined.
The wrestling community is
making one of the biggest advances
for women’s sports by getting
females involved in wrestling.
Female wrestling is one of the fastest
growing sports for women in our
nation and in the world. I have heard
that women’s wrestling will be added
to the Olympics in 2004!
So please rethink the statement
made in the article. What you are
doing is assuming that by attacking
Title IX, we are attacking women’s
sports. However, wrestling is a
women’s sport too, so if that were the
case, we’d be attacking our own
sport.
Mako Furukawa
graduate student
chemistry
The feeding hand
Whichever DN editor wrote that
Nebraska football is the reason NU
Wrestling Coach Tim Neumann had
to cheat to win proved exactly how
badly the DN needs quality writers.
What kind of a moron blames the
hand that feeds it for the problems of
the weak. Face it: Without football,
you can kiss Title IX, wrestling and
all other sports goodbye. Football
pays for it all!
I am tired of hearing how there
are eight scholarship I-Backs on the
team. Big deal, we need that many in,
case of injuries. You know why we
don’t need eight scholarship heavy
weight wrestlers? Because even if
one gets hurt, nobody cares. The
most attention wrestling has made in
my five years here just occurred this
month because their coach cheated.
Matt Honke
senior
advertising
“Evaluated accordingly”
In response to Professor Starr’s
comments on Dr. Reinhard’s letter,
perhaps the fact that a professor of
music chairing the ARRC committee
determining wrongs committed with
the scientific study and handling of
human remains should also therefore
in her own words “be evaluated
accordingly.”
Ben Wolfe
graduate student
department of geology
and geophysics
Reinhard’s right
Karl Reinhard (DN, Monday)
argues that the recommendation of
the Academic Rights and
Responsibilities Professional
Conduct Committee to dismiss him
was based on what he characterizes
as a “witch hunt.” The response from
Committee Chairwoman Pamela
Starr (DN, Tuesday) does not address
his specific complaints but main
tains that the committee worked very
hard and followed all applicable pro
cedures.
Professor Reinhard has provided
the formal report of the Committee’s
conclusions and recommendations to
the Academic Freedom Coalition Of
Nebraska (AFCON), a statewide
coalition of organizations concerned
with intellectual freedom in the
schools, colleges and libraries of
Nebraska. AFCON has prepared a
detailed response and has sent it to
everyone involved in the investiga
tion.
Consider just one example of
AFCON’s many concerns.
Responding to a charge that
“Reinhard transmitted his unethical
and immoral values to his students,”
the committee apparently assumed
that UNL policy permits formal
action against faculty who, in the
presence of students, express or
model ideas or values that others
deem unethical or immoral. Thus, by
a vote of 3-2 (with one abstention), it
found Reinhard guilty of this charge
on the basis of testimony that
"Reinhard’s actions might have been
perceived as a negative model for
professional conduct by his stu
dents,” “he set a bad example” and
that he “had frequently disparaged
the work of some of his colleagues to
graduate students.”
Overall, AFCON concluded that
“the entire investigation was tainted
by damaging testimony, evidence
and discussion relevant only to sev
eral illegitimate and improperly
investigated charges ... and showed a
remarkable insensitivity to academic
freedom, freedom of expression and
First Amendment rights ... Whatever
Professor Reinhard may be guilty of,
if anything, UNL is clearly guilty of
an abusive investigation into his
beliefs, values, teaching and research
that went far beyond any legitimate
charge against him ”
David Moshman
professor of educational
psychology
AFCON policy coordinator
Dwayne Ball
associate professor of marketing
president-elect, AFCON
Salvage the shards
I was deeply concerned by
Pamela Starr’s statement that Karl
Reinhard has an “incomplete knowl
edge of the material considered” by
the Academic Rights and
Responsibilities Panel. ARRC pro
cedures, as well as the fundamental
principles of American law, require
that Reinhard be given copies of all
materials used in the case against
him. If he had not been provided with
all such materials, then the commit
tee’s deliberations were even more
flawed than it first appeared.
If she wished to salvage whatever;
shards of legitimacy remain attached
to the ARRC report, she needed to
immediately resolve this point.
Gerard Harbison
professor of biochemistry
