Page 6 - The Behrend College Collegian - Thursday, April 23, 1998 National Campus News
Microsoft quits
deal to wire
California
campuses
By Jon Healey. San Jose Mercury
News, Calif.
Knight-Ridder Newspapers
Apr. 17 —Microsoft Corp. has
dropped out of a controversial effort
to wire the California State Univer
sity campuses, saying the proposed
public-private partnership involved
too much risk and not enough reward.
The decision, which officials from
CSU and Microsoft say was a joint
one, removes one of the most hotly
debated elements of the so-called
California Educational Technology
Initiative. Nevertheless, CSU Chan
cellor Charles B. Reed said Thursday
that there continues to be only a 50-
50 chance that the $3OO million
project will get off the ground.
Two of the four original corporate
partners Microsoft and Hughes
Space and Communications Co.
are no longer part of the effort, Reed
disclosed in a press release. Discus
sions are continuing with GTE Corp.
and Fujitsu, but Reed said no conclu
sion may be reached until well after
classes resume in the fall.
“We’re going to be looking for
some new partners, and, hopefully,
they’ll be California partners,” Reed
said.
CSU officials came up with the idea
for the public-private partnership
early in 1997, after concluding that
state government would not provide
the money needed to bring high
speed, high-capacity communications
o all the campuses. After approach
ing potential partners quietly for pro
posals, the university system an
nounced a tentative deal with the four
companies in September.
The agreement called for CSU to
turn over the 22 campuses’ telephone
and computer networks to the partner
ship, with the corporate partners put
ting up $3OO million by 2000 for the
long-sought upgrades.
In return, the partners would absorb
CSU’s annual budget for those net
works an estimated $lOO million
and gain up to $384 million each
year from spin-off businesses, includ
ing some educational projects. The
proposal quickly drew flak from fac
ulty members who fell their authority
over education was threatened, stu
dents who protested the choice of
Microsoft, and competing high-tech
companies who feared they would be
shut out of future sales to CSU. The
protests gathered steam, leading to
some critical attention from state law
makers.
In the meantime, negotiations over
the final details of the deal dragged
on, forcing repeated delays in the fi
nal reviews by faculty and trustees.
Reed said Thursday that those delays
reflected not the mounting criticism
so much as the difficulties in settling
key details, such as how to assure that
the partners would not favor their own
products over competitors’.
The biggest sticking point appar
ently was determining who would pay
off the debt resulting from the $3OO
million in upgrades. That issue led to
the falling out with both Microsoft
and Hughes.
Elizabeth King, general manager of
Microsoft’s education customer unit,
said, “What it came down to was, we
were being looked to for a larger fi
nancial investment than we were com
fortable making.” Although Microsoft
has made some major investments in
the past year — including pouring $1
billion into Comcast Corp., a cable
TV company the CSU project “re
quired much more investment capital
than we were prepared to make to any
customer,” King said.
King’s statement illustrates the
problem that CSU had with the com
pany. “We were never a partner,”
Reed said. “We were a customer. They
Reed said that in addition to look
ing for new partners, CSU will con
sider shouldering some of the debt it
self. University officials had said last
year that they would not be respon
sible for any of the debt, but Reed said
Thursday, “That’s like saying you’re
going to get something for nothing.”
Although Microsoft was clearly the
lightning rod for protests, the partner
ship remains controversial.
One critic of the partnership
Nathan Newman of Net Action, a San
Francisco-based consumer advocacy
group - said the announced changes
were a victory because “it’s not just
going to be a Microsoft-only environ
ment in the CSU system.” But
Newman remained concerned about
what CSU might be giving up to guar
antee GTE business, saying, “The
whole deal is very problematic in
terms of open competition for con-
sumers
Two members of the Assembly who
registered early concerns about the
partnership Ted Lempert, D-Palo
Alto, and Debra Bowen, D-Marinadel
Rev said many serious issues re
main to be resolved.
“The problem wasn’t who the part
ners were. The problem was that CSU
was doing this as a privately negoti
ated, sole-sourced deal,” Bowen said.
“Are students getting a good deal? Do
we really need what’s being pro
posed? Who winds up paying the
freight for the (partnership) agree
ment, how much does it cost, and how
much financial risk does the state
take?”
Lempert said that university offi
cials probably do need to recruit pri
vate industry to help upgrade the CSU
networks
But, he added, “they could not show
how the four original partners could
ensure that current vendors and po
tential vendors would have a fair
chance at CSU business.” Nor has
CSU shown how it could keep con
trol of the partnership so that corpo
rate interests wouldn’t trump the
university’s interests, Lempert said.
Reed offered his guarantee that the
deal won’t allow the partners to be
come exclusive suppliers an im
portant concession to the proposal’s
corporate opponents. “It’s a good con
cept, but getting it from the concept
to the actual day-to-day operations
and working intricacies, that’s the
hard part,” he said.
Many faculty members also remain
concerned about how the deal could
affect how decisions are made about
education, said Gerie Bledsoe, gen
eral manager of the faculty labor
union. “It’s the intrusion of corporate
America into a public institution
that’s just the biggie, almost regard
less of how it’s structured in the busi
ness deal,” he said.
“Most surveys that have gone out
are hugely against (the partnership),”
with 75 or 80 percent of the faculty
opposed, said Gerald Eisman, chair
man of the San Francisco State Uni-
versity computer science program.
Despite a lot of discussion about the
issue over the past several months,
Eisman said, “I can’t really say opin
ions have changed.... People formed
positions very early.”
Reed said the talks among the part
ners would continue on a daily basis
through the summer. He also said
talks with Microsoft would continue
to see if a better price could be nego
tiated for its software, which already
is used throughout the university sys
tem.
“I’m not going to recommend
something just to recommend some
thing. It has to pass fiduciary tests that
it is in the best interest of CSU and
the faculty and the students.”
Brown adopts ‘no sweatshop’
code for its merchandise
By Brian C. Jones
Knight-Ridder Newspapers
PROVIDENCE, R.I. - Brown Uni
versity has adopted a tough new “code
of conduct,” requiring companies that
supply university monogrammed
clothing and souvenirs to reform
sweatshop-style factories that may be
making the goods.
The code came after four months
of negotiations with students con
cerned that athletic uniforms, T-shirts,
stationery and other items using uni
versity logos and names be produced
in humanely and legally run factories.
At least $1.5 million worth of
goods, supplied by 100 vendors to
Brown, will be affected by the code,
which calls on suppliers to make sure
factories - including those overseas -
pay acceptable wages and operate
safely.
“Though it is a small institution,
Brown has a loud voice, and we in
tend to use that voice,” said E. Gor
don Gee, Brown’s president, in a
statement read at a campus rally on
Wednesday about the issue.
Brown is hoping that other colleges
and universities will adopt similar
standards, and that their collective
efforts will force improvements, as
well as provide funds to monitor con
ditions in the factories.
The Wednesday rally featured two
young workers from a 2,000-em
ployee factory in the Dominican Re
public that produces baseball caps
sold to Brown and other universities
by Champion Products Inc. of Win
ston-Salem, N.C.
One of the workers, speaking
through a translator, said she and other
women were forced to take pregnancy
tests before they were hired to make
sure pregnancy wouldn’t interfere
with their ability to work, and that she
was slapped by supervisors to the
point where she cried.
Francesca Gessner, a Brown senior
and one of the organizers of the drive
to produce a code, said she was
shocked to leam Brown baseball caps
Legally blind, Harvard
student looks forward
to marathon
By Campus Correspondent Alex
Alfredo (Boston University)
BOSTON - Richard Chen wanted
to join a Glee club when he was an
undergraduate student, so he asked the
director for a chance.
The director turned him down be
cause he figured Chen, who is legally
blind, wouldn’t be able to follow the
“I don’t know how fast I can be, but I know I will
finish it ”
choreography of each performance.
“Some people say ‘You cannot do
this, and you cannot do that,’ without
even giving (me) a try,” he said, shak
ing his head. “It’s very sad. I think
they’re wrong, but it’s behind me
now.”
Determined not to let his blindness
prevent him from setting goals, Chen,
a 25-year-old law student at Harvard
University, has confronted some
tough challenges. The latest will come
Monday, April 20, when he becomes
one of 12,000 runners bent on partici
pating in one of the world’s most fa
mous running events - the 102nd Bos
ton Marathon.
“That’s not something I have to do,
you know, or something that’s ex
pected of me,” Chen said. “It’s some
thing I can do just because I want to.
I don’t care about my time. This one
is about the experience of finishing
and seeing what’s going on in a mara
thon. The most important thing is fin
ishing.”
The Massachusetts Association for
the Blind (MAB), through its Team
with a Vision, will provide three run
ning guides to the 47 visually im-
purportedly were made under the kind
of conditions being targeted.
It was only last week that UNITE,
the Union of Needletrades, Industrial
and Textile Employees, issued a re
port on the factory, then sponsored
visits to universities around the coun
try where the baseball caps are sold,
she said.
The union report said the
caps generally sell for
$19.95, of which
universities and colleges
receive at least $1.50, but
workers only get 8 cents
in wages per cap
The union report said the caps gen
erally sell for $19.95, of which uni
versities and colleges receive at least
$1.50, but workers only get 8 cents in
wages per cap. The report said work
ers were struck, fired if injured on the
job, or fired when they talked about
unionizing.
“It was quite embarrassing when
the news came out,” Gessner said.
“The workers who spoke held up
baseball caps, and said that 'I make
these every day,’ and described hor
rible working conditions.”
Gessner said she and the other 25
members of the Student Labor Alli
ance didn’t know before their drive
for a code that specific products sold
at Brown had come from problem
companies.
Nancy Young, a spokeswoman for
Champion, told the Journal-Bulletin
that the company had found none of
the problems described by the work
ers or UNITE when it sent inspection
teams to the Dominican Republic fac
tory. The latest inspection was on
Monday, she said.
“It’s one of those situations where
we’ve looked at it - looked at it an
nounced and unannounced - and have
not seen those situations,” Young said.
paired athletes running the 26.2-mile
race.
Chen’s guide will be 33-year-old
Mike Lewis, who is also a graduate
student at Harvard.
“Chen has done remarkable
things,” Lewis said. “He always puts
a lot of energy into everything he
does. He never demands, he never
asks for help. He’s just amazingly
Richard Chen
motivated.”
Chen has been training for the big
event. Currently, he is running up to
eight miles a day, six times a week.
He works out at the Harvard Univer
sity Athletic Facility; faster runners
pass him on the track, but he doesn’t
mind.
“I don’t know how fast I can be,
but I know I will finish it,” he said.
Monday’s marathon is the latest in
a series of adventures Chen has em
barked upon. Despite his dim and
blurry view of the world, he manages
to play a variety of sports. His travels
have take him to Canada, Korea, Ja
pan, Mexico and Taiwan. Refusing to
take no for an answer, he joined the
Glee Club at Harvard and sings a va
riety of classical pieces.
“I wanna be able to do different
things in a single day,” he said. “ I
like to pack my day. It bothers me in
credibly wasting time.”
“Basically, I don’t think there’s a
single solitary goal for me,” he con
tinued. “I think I can reach a good
number of the goals that I set, but If
don’t reach them all, that’s fine.”
and said the company was one of the
better contractors inspectors had seen.
But for “business reasons” unre
lated to the union allegation, Cham
pion has decided to remove its busi
ness from that plant.
Using factories around the world
for more than 20 years, Champion has
its own code of conduct and standards
for subcontractors, she said. And she
added:
“We certainly never would do any
thing to put our brand in jeopardy. It’s
not good business.”
According to the students who
pushed for the Brown code, the
university’s standards are not intended
to force companies to leave subcon
tracting companies - something they
feel would hurt workers - but instead
to first try to improve them.
The standards apply to companies
that have licenses bearing the
university’s name and symbols, say
ing the firms should make sure facto
ries that produce their goods operate
legally and are environmentally re
sponsible.
Here are some of the provisions,
some of which are below federal and
state working standards in the United
-Wages: Must “comply with all ap
plicable laws and regulations ... and
match or exceed the local prevailing
wages and benefits in the relevant in
dustry.” Overtime should be paid at
legal rates “but no less than at a rate
equal to their regular hourly compen
sation rate.”
-Work week: “Except in extraordi
nary circumstances, employees shall
not be required to work more than the
lesser of (a) 48 hours per week and
12 hours of overtime, or (b) the lim
its on regular and overtime hours al
lowed by the law of the country.”
-Child labor: Banned for workers
15 years old or younger, or 14 in some
developing countries. The age should
be higher if education requirements
mandate that. If the requirements put
children at a disadvantage, Brown and
the licensing companies should try to
Sought-after MBA’s
must carefully weigh
tempting offers
By Diana Kunde
Knight-Ridder Newspapers
It’s the kind of problem you’d like
to have,
Recruiting activity at leading
graduate schools of business has
ratcheted way up, even compared
with last year’s hot market. Top MBA
students are getting three to six firm
job offers, placement officials say.
And recruiters pressing for early de
cisions are offering “exploding” bo
nuses - extra sign-on money that dis
appears after a deadline.
“I’ve been here 10 years now, and
I’ve never seen anything like it,” said
Peter Veruki, director of career plan
ning and placement for Vanderbilt
University’s Owen Graduate School
of Management. “It’s a pretty heady
experience.”
So what’s the beef? Some students
may make poor career choices under
the pressure of being wined, dined and
romanced with big-money offers from
corporate recruiters. “They might tend
to take a short-term view and go for
the big bucks or the glamorous com
pany instead of cutting through and
asking, 'ls this where I really be
long?”’ Veruki said.
Data on starting salaries for May
and June MBA grads won’t be avail
able until fall. But JobTrak Corp., an
Internet job-posting service, reports a
38 percent increase in jobs listed at
MBA schools for the first quarter
compared with last year’s first quar
ter.
Jamie King, assistant director for
MBA career services at the Univer
sity of Texas in Austin, compares the
“minimize" the impact.
-Other provisions: Discrimination,
forced labor, harassment are discour
aged, as are attempts to ban unions or
other worker associations.
The code acknowledges that en
forcement will be difficult. As a first
step, it wants companies to identify
factories they use, provide written
assurances of compliance with the
code and a list of steps taken to com
ply with the code.
Mark Nickel, a Brown spokesman,
said one of the major needs for Brown
and other universities that adopt such
codes will be to find independent
companies or agencies that have in
formation about factories and can
monitor them.
The code is something on which
students and the university adminis
tration agree, Nickel said, and he
noted that this week’s rally was one
of those rare occasions where student
activists praised university efforts.
A key player in the code negotia
tions was Larry Carr, director of the
Brown Bookstore, where many of the
goods are sold, and manager of prod
uct licensing for the university. He
said nearly 5,000 kinds of items are
sold. In addition, the code applies to
uniforms for 35 varsity teams.
Gessner, one of the student orga
nizers, said what excited her about the
months-long campaign to adopt the
code was that it seemed an example
of activism for a generation of col
lege students often labeled as apoliti
cal.
Her group polled other students,
and found that 90 percent would be
willing to pay higher prices for goods
as long as they were assured that they
were produced under humane condi
tions, she said.
“This might not be the ’6os”
Gessner said of a tumultuous decade
on many campuses. “But this might
be our generation’s way of respond
ing to globalization and the power of
corporations so many people feel
helpless against.”
frenzied recruiting activity this year
to rush at a fraternity or sorority.
“They make it emotionally exhaust
ing to say no. We have a student who
had several offers but two she was
choosing between. A recruiter took
her to dinner and asked, 'What’s it
going to take to get you?’ She told him
she didn't want to live in that area.
So he said, How about we put in
$20,000 extra?’ She said she just
didn’t want to live there. He said, OK,
how about $30,000?’”
The student was able to base her
decision on career and life goals, but
such clearheadedness can be tough,
King said. “The money is so appeal
ing to someone who’s been broke for
a couple of years.”
There’s nothing wrong with money,
of course. If making lots of it is a
student’s primary goal, the job choice
may be easier. But for those who want
to weigh other factors, career experts
and MBAs offer some tips:
-Stay focused. Vanderbilt MBA stu
dent Marc Jason Smith decided fairly
early on he wanted a career in com
mercial banking and limited his
choices to three offers.
“Since I targeted one particular in
dustry, I looked for a firm I’d feel
comfortable with,” Smith said. After
numerous conversations with bank
officers and Vanderbilt alums who
work at the three firms, he settled on
Chase Bank of Texas and will enter
its management training program in
Dallas.
The training program’s flexibility
appealed to him, Smith said. “They
seemed very willing to work with
me,” he said.