page 4- The Behrend College Beacon. Thursday, October I, 1998
The Behrend College Beacon
published weekly by the students of Penn State Erie, The Behrend College
News Editor
Will Jordan
Photography Editor
Andrea Zaffino
Associate Editor
Mark Greenbank
Business Manager
Jaime Davis
Advisors
Robert Speel
Jim O 'Loughlin
Postal Information: The Beacon is
published weekly by the students of
Penn State Erie, The Behrend
College; First Floor, The J. Elmer
Reed Union Building, Station Road,
Erie, PA 16563. The Beacon can be
reached by calling (814) 898-6488 or
(814) 898-6019 (FAX). ISSN 1071-
9288.
A view from the lighthouse
Misconceptions about the
morning after pill
The front page article in last week’s
Beacon about emergency contracep
tion at the Health and Wellness Cen
ter sparked a lot of discussion about
the technicalities of the morning af
ter pill. Some students, despite what
Patty Pasky McMahon stated, still
believe that the morning after pill is
really an abortion pill. However, the
morning after pill is virtually the same
as birth control pills, only in a higher
dosage. The pill prevents an egg from
attaching to the lining of the uterus or
prevents the ovary from releasing the
egg in the first place.
While a person’s first priority
should be practicing safe sex, acci
dents can occur. The morning after
pill is back-up in case something
should go wrong. The availability of
the pill at the Health and Wellness
Center is valuable knowledge to many
Behrend women.
The Health and Wellness Center
also has information about dangers
such as the date rape drug and what
to do if you are sexually assaulted. If
a woman is sexually assaulted, she
should know about the morning after
pill, and how it is used.
Merit and the relevance of race in college admissions
By William G. Bowen and Derek
Bok
Special to the Los Angeles Times
In his classic study of Wall
Street lawyers in the 19605, Erwin
Smigel reports that “I only heard of
three Negroes who had been hired
by large law firms. Two of these
were women who did not meet the
client.” Smigel’s statement is not
surprising. In the 19605, few lead
ing professional schools or nation
ally prominent colleges and univer
sities enrolled more than a handful
of minority students. In the late
19605, however, colleges and uni
versities began to change these sta
tistics, not by establishing quotas,
but by considering race, along with
many other factors, in deciding
whom to admit. This policy was
adopted because of a widely shared
conviction that it was simply wrong
for overwhelming numbers of mi
norities to continue holding routine
jobs while almost all influential po
sitions were held by whites.
Educators also considered it
vital to create a more diverse learn
ing environment to prepare students
of all races to live and work in a
multiracial society.
In recent years, race-sensi
tive admissions policies have been
vigorously contorted. Surprisingly,
however, there has been little hard
evidence of how these policies work
and what their consequences have
been. To remedy this deficiency, we
examined the college and later-life
experiences of tens of thousands of
black and white students who en
tered 28 selective colleges and uni
versities in the fall of 1976 and the
fall of 1989. What did we discover?
Compared with their ex
tremely high-achieving white class
mates, blacks in general received
somewhat lower college grades and
Editor in Chief
Anne Rajotte
Managing Editor
Ayodele Jones
Features Editor
Jon Stubbs
Sports Editor
Jason Snyder
Layout Editor
Mike Perkins
Rose Forrest
Advertising Manager
Erin Edinger
Carey Smith
Letter Policy: The Beacon
encourages letters to the editor.
Letters should include the address,
phone number, semester standing and
major of the writer. Writers can mail
their letters to behrcoll2@aol.com.
Letters must be received no later than
spm Tuesday for inclusion in that
week’s issue.
Though some students were angry
that the Beacon printed an article
about emergency contraception on the
front page, the morning after pill has
been approved for over the counter
sale in certain locations, and will be
come more prevalent in the United
States in the future. Every person at
Behrend should be aware of the avail
ability of the morning after pill at the
Health and Wellness Center. They
should also be aware of the truth about
the pill. It is not an abortion pill.
Students should remember that
emergency contraception is available
on campus. This information could
prevent an unwanted pregnancy.
graduated at moderately lower
rates. Still, 75 percent graduated
within six years, a figure well
above the 40 percent of blacks and
59 percent of whites who gradu
ated from all Division I NCAA
schools. More than 90 percent of
both blacks and whites in our sur
vey were satisfied or very satis
fied with their college
experience, and blacks were even
more inclined than whites to credit
their undergraduate experience
with helping them learn crucial
skills.
Although more than half
the black students attending these
schools would have been rejected
under a race-neutral admissions
regime, they have done exceed
ingly well after college. A remark
able 40 percent of black graduates
who entered these selective col
leges in 1976 went on to earn doc
torates or professional degrees in
the most sought-after fields of law,
business and medicine. This fig
ure is slightly higher than that for
their white classmates and five
times higher than that for all black
B.A.s nationwide.
By the time of our survey,
black male graduates who had en
tered these schools in 1976,
though typically under age 40,
were earning an average of
$85,000, 82 percent more than
other black male college graduates
nationwide. Their black female
classmates earned 73 percent
more than all black women B.A.s.
But the blacks we studied were not
simply “looking out for No. 1.”
In virtually every type of
civic activity; from social service
organizations to parent-teacher as
sociations; black men were more
likely than their white male class
mates to occupy leadership posi
Live from Guyana
America’s favorite pastime
I am a huge Yankees fan, okay well
maybe a huge Derek Jeter fan, but
what do you expect. I am a New
Yorker. Since my “infallible” Knicks
always fail to get past the Indiana
Pacers, The Miami Heat or Da Bulls,
I’ve decided to finally take on a New
York team which will presumably not
end the season early and will not give
me heartaches. This in mind, I fol
lowed every Yankees game and was
so proud of my home team which was
at one point in time almost fifty
games ahead of five hundred. This
was one of the main focus points on
local sports news and ESPN; of
course the other one being the home
run derby occurring between Sosa,
McGwire, and Griffey. The latter
eventually eclipsed the incredible
feats being accomplished by the Yan
kees and soon the nation’s attention
was turned to who would be the first
to break Roger Maris’ home run
record.
Baseball is as American as apple
pie and it’s America’s national pas-
rdina
Stop whining and do something this weekend
So, it’s another weekend here
at Behrend and you’re looking for
something to do. You live on cam
pus, and decided not to go home un
like the other 80% of the student
body. The horrendous snowfall
hasn’t yet begun, contrary to the oh
so accurate Erie weathermen, but you
don’t have a car to go off campus
anyway. Your psychotic glue-sniff
ing roommate thankfully decided to
go home, but all your other friends
did as well. The big question is what
do you do for some fun. Obviously
you have plenty of homework to do,
but hey, you’re in college now and
homework is optional. If you get
motivated enough you can get off
your computer and out of the chat
room, or maybe quit playing your
Nintendo 64 and leave your room.
Many students say that there
tions. (Latinos and other minority
groups also appear to have done
well, but too few entered in 1976
to permit an equally detailed
analysis.)
Were black students de
moralized by competing with
whites possessing higher high
school grades and test scores? Is
it true, as conservative scholar and
author Dinesh D’Souza asserts,
that “American universities are
quite willing to sacrifice the fu
ture happiness of many young
blacks and Hispanics to achieve
diversity, proportional representa
tion and what they consider to be
multiracial progress”? The facts
are very clear on this point.
Among blacks with similar test
scores, the more selective the col
lege they attend (that is, the higher
the test scores of their classmates),
the likelier they are to graduate,
earn advanced degrees and receive
high salaries. Far from being de
moralized, blacks from the most
selective schools are the most sat
isfied with their college experi
ence.
How much does diversity
add to the learning experience?
Have blacks and whites learned to
get along better or has diversity
resulted in self-segregation and
greater tension? Undoubtedly,
blacks often spend time together
(as do hockey players, campus
newspaper editors and other stu
dent groups). But much interac
tion also occurs. Eighty-eight per
cent of blacks who entered selec
tive colleges in 1989 report hav
ing known well two or more white
classmates, while 56 percent of
their white classmates say that
they knew at least two black class
mates well. How many older
Americans can make that claim?
Editorial
time, but before this season I was not
at all intrigued or excited by this
sport. In fact it elicited no greater
feelings in me than that of attending
a Tupperware convention. I didn’t
posses the same passion for this sport
as I did for basketball. I felt for
Charles Smith (former forward of the
New York Knicks) when he tried and
tried and even tried again to make a
lay-up under the encompassing pres
ence of Scottie Pippen. I literally
cried in agony. Yet my Knicks didn’t
always solicit feelings of anger and
depression. One of my greatest mo
ments as a Knicks fan occurred on
Tuesday May 25,1993, when John
Starks dunked on the “great” Michael
Jordan.
Nine innings of baseball didn’t in
trigue me, but rather it was a way to
pass a lazy Saturday afternoon if there
wasn’t a good movie on AMC. After
watching one game earlier this year,
I decided that I was really missing
something, the attractive players
Colle
is never anything to do on the week
ends here. One popular avenue that
many students pursue is partying.
There is a general feeling on this
campus and many others that if stu
dents are not going to a party, then
there is nothing worth doing. While
there is nothing really wrong with
going to a Greek party to hang out,
or any party for that matter, students
need to open their eyes and realize
that there are other things to do for
weekend entertainment. If students
would simply walk around and read
the hundreds of signs put up by all
the different organizations they
would realize that other things do
occur here Friday through Sunday,
That’s why turnout at most on-cam
pus events is so poor. Advertising
alternatives have been tried and they
still fail. It’s not that the organiza
Looking back, large majorities of
blacks, whites and Latinos believe that
their college experience contributed
much to their ability to live and work
with members of other races. Almost 80
percent of the white graduates favor re
taining their school’s current emphasis
on diversity or emphasizing it even
more.
Our findings also clarify the
much misunderstood concept of “merit”
in college admissions. Selective col
leges do not automatically offer admis
sion as a reward for past performance.
Many students, white and black, are re
jected even though they finished in the
top 5 percent of their high school class.
Admissions officers do not admit sim
ply “by the numbers” because they
dent
e St,
which compose the thirty teams of
Major League Baseball. After my as
tonishing discovery, I was further sur
prised that as the season progressed I
was more interested in who won and
their standings in the American and
National League rather than who was
at bat.
Albeit, I only know the fundamen
tal principles of baseball, I cannot
ramble on about players, individual
errors or RBl’s, but I could tell you
won last night, who was on a win
ning or losing streak and what player,
if any, got traded. I may have gotten
interested in baseball for the wrong
reasons (how good the players looked
in uniform), but I can definitely say
now that I see baseball as not only a
spectator but rather as a fan.
This season has been filled of ma
jor accomplishments for Major
League Baseball. Just to name a few,
Sammy Sosa of the Chicago Cubs
and Mark McGwire stirred national
interest in their contest to break Roger
tions need to be more creative, it is
the simple fact that nobody takes the
time to stop and read a sign, listen to
a voicemail message, or hear about
what is taking place.
Bruno’s has at least one event
taking place every weekend in addi
tion to the movie shown over half
the week every week. Okay, so the
comedians aren’t always the best,
and the other acts can be a bit
strange, and there are usually pro
jector and sound difficulties with the
movie, but it’s still something to do.
Also, there is the multitude of sports
events which take place on week
ends, as well as intramurals. The
Blue Bus Occasionally makes trips
for a small price and there are many
other day trips that take place. There
are BBQ’s, speakers, dances, and
other interesting programs going on.
know that grades and test scores,
though important, do not deter
mine how much applicants con
tribute to their fellow classmates
or how they perform in later life.
Rather, admissions officers
select those applicants most likely
to help the institution fulfill its
educational objectives and its re
sponsibilities to society. For selec
tive institutions, meritorious stu
dents are those above a high aca
demic threshold who seem most
likely to enhance the education of
other students and contribute to
their professions and communi
ties. From this perspective, the
minority students admitted to the
28 institutions in our study have
Maris’ home run record, Cal Ripken
Jr. of the Baltimore Orioles ended his
streak of consecutive games played,
the left handed pitcher of the Yankees,
David Wells, pitched a perfect game
and last but not least Barry Bonds of
the San Francisco Giants went into a
league of his own, with four hundred
lifetime home runs and four hundred
steals. All who had no prior interest
in this sport were encouraged by the
excessive media coverage following
these historic feats.
The combination of these memo
rable and notable moments made this
season one to remember. In the end
I’ll always love my passion filled and
adrenaline pumping games of basket
ball, but I’ll gladly put those games
on hold to witness a part of history
being made on a lazy afternoon with
a tied game, bottom of the ninth,
bases loaded and a full count. Here
comes the pitch, the batter swings ..
Jones is managing editor of the Bea
con. Live from Guyana apppears ev
ery 3 weeks..
In addition, students need to take the
initiative and create things to do and
not rely on on-campus groups to cre
ate weekend activities, especially
while the weather is still decent out
side. If students don’t wish to join
one of the 10,000,000 clubs and or
ganizations on this campus then they
really have no room to complain.
It’s just frustrating to hear stu
dents bitch, whine, moan and com
plain that there is never anything to
do. Maybe if these students got out
of their mole hole of a room, got in
volved in something, quit binge
drinking every weekend, or partici
pated in some form, then these same
students would have something to
do, or have a say in what goes on in
regards to weekend activities.
Greenbank is associate editor of the
Beacon. The Ordinary College Stu
dent appears every 3 weeks.
been “meritorious” in the best
sense of the term
A mandate to ignore race in
choosing applicants would require
that more than half the black stu
dents attending these selective in
stitutions be rejected.
Would society be better off
as a result? Considering the edu
cational benefits of diversity and
the need to include more highly
qualified minorities in the top
ranks of business, government and
the professions, our findings con
vince us that the answer is no.