page 4 - The Behrend College Beacon. Thursday, April 8, 1999 The Behrend College Beacon published weekly bx the students of Penn State Erie, The Behrend College News Editor Shannon Weber Editorial Page Editor \ahilie Gai’lumo Business Manager Jaime Davis Photography Editors Jason Blake Andrea Aiffino Layout Editors Mike Perkins Elitabetli Guelcher Wire Services Editor Kane Galley Features Editor Jon Stubbs 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 A chance for great opportunity The master plan calls for rapid growth (if the Behrend campus (buildings as well as student popula tion) due to the fact that University Park's enrollment is too large. Knowledge Park, a training center which will he utilized hy engineer ing students, is currently under con struction. Also, a Research and Eco nomic Development Center will be built on Jordan Road to accommodate the needs of Business, Engineering, and Engineering Technology stu dents. An athletic building is also in the works. I bis building will include a swimming pool, running tracks, and various exercise equipment. Also, parking garages will be built to de crease the amount of space taken up for parking. All in all, this expansion will greatly increase the number of oppor tunities available to Behrend students. Know ledge Park will increase the number of internships and research conducted. The parking garages will take up less space than would park- A response to forwarded chain letters By Maria Savvas The Simpsonian Simpson College "Warning: If you do not pass this on. something as bad as those in the stories or WORSE will happen to Please, it this were really true, I would have been dead a long time ago. Fortunately, I’ve been able to steer clear of any 18-wheelers that would like to make me their next road kill victim. Forwards. They are an almost un avoidable pan of everyday life for anyone who holds an email account. In my opinion, bored college kids who hav e a lot of extra time on their hands make up most of these stories. These little hassles are received on the average of three to four mes sages in a day. More if everyone has your address, less if you are one of the fortunate ones. If any of these stories actually come true, I should receive a check in the amount of $5OO dollars, a trip to Disney Land, while possibly find ing my soul mate in the next seven days. Do you think that if you for ward a message to as many people that you can think of you’re going to he paid for it? By sending one of the forwards to just I Oof my friends my crush will ask me out. On the other hand if I don't send a different one in the next hour of receiving it, I am going to have bad luck in relationships for the rest of my life. I don’t think this is a very legit way to base the future of Editor in Chief VViM Jordan Managing Editor Ayodele Jones Sports Editor Jason Snyder 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 letters to behrcoll2@aol.com. Letters must be received no later than spm Tuesday for inclusion in that week’s issue. rom the li ing lots. This will maintain the cam pus' landscape while still increasing the number of parking spaces; this should be a relief to all those com muters who experience great diffi culty when trying to find a decent parking space. Also, the new athletic building will help to maintain the students’ physical and mental health through relaxing activities, such as swimming. Kudos to the university for for mulating such an enriching master plan! my relationships on. If I was going to have bad luck in relationships for the rest of my life, I probably don’t need some forward to tell me. What I don’t get is why all the meaningless ones get passed around to everyone. In my case I receive most of my forwards from my friends. If they know that they are dumb and they don’t want them, then why do they send them to me? With the overabundance of all the forwards that are being passed around, I know that I, and some of my friends, are starting to delete them without even reading them. Unless there is a check made out to me when you send it, or you really want to be involved in a kiss war with me, don’t waste your time. While most of these forwards are just company for my trash can, some of them, I have to admit, can be comical. Most of the jokes are pretty funny in a sick sort of way and who wouldn’t want to take a cool quiz? So not all of them are bad, but just learn to sort them be fore you send them. As a last bit of helpful informa tion, here’s a forward not to waste your time with. If you received the, “So kewl, gotta try this,” forward that you have to send to 11 people, don’t. Sorry to disappoint the people who want to see the really hilarious video, because there isn’t one. Advertising Managers Erin Edinper Carey Smith Copy Editor Rose Forrest Associate Editors Anftela Rush Jessica Tucci Assistant Editor Mike F raw ley Distribution Manager Mark Greenbank Advisors Robert Speel Jim O'hntghlin thous The Critic . . NATO bombings accomplishing According to the Yugoslav Ambas sador to the U.S., there have been "about a couple hundred" Yugoslav civilian deaths due to the NATO bomb ing campaign in Kosovo. This num ber is dwarfed by the number of Alba nian refugees that have been either re located or killed by Serb forces in Kosovo. But isn't one civilian death one too many, especially when it does nothing to speed up the peace progress between NATO and Yugoslavian Presi dent Slobodan Milosevic? NATO would argue no at this point, certain "collateral losses" must be accepted. In war, perhaps, civilian losses may be unavoidable. But this isn't a war, yet. So far it has been a heavily armed police action. A police action that is A ■ m 7 • 7 Go to the back of the line Here's the situation: you are at a store and are in line to buy something. The lady in front of you steps out of line and off to the side to speak with a friend. The cashier gestures to you and takes your items. The lady, clearly not in line, announces that she was next in line. Has this happened to you? Maybe you're the person that steps out of line expecting someone to let you hack in. Mayhe you have dealt with a line cut ter that wants to be with a buddy and so cuts in front of you or the person wanted something badly enough and decided tocut in line (i.e. housing con tracts). Maybe it's because I am short and people think they can push me around so they step out of line just to see how far they can get. Well enough step out of Letter to the editor: former staff member blows off steam Over the past few weeks I have been reading the Beacon. This may seem like a shock to those who know me because I've had my share of prob lems with the Beacon. After reading a few articles on the editorial pages, I decided that I would write a letter to express some disgust and anguish. I would like to start with the March 25 edition of the paper. The column titled Time to Complain really set me off, so I am going to start there. At this point it would help for me to state that I was a member of the pa per staff last and the previous year. And I actually did try to help the newspa per to become better and not suck. However, each time I brought up an idea or questioned changes, 1 was al ways shot down. Why? Part of it I admit was because I didn’t always do it in the best possible manner. When other staff members agreed with me that they didn’t like something or wanted to change some thing, I was more than happy to bring it up. I feel new ideas should have at least been considered. When I did bring up changes, I was told that they were not going to be considered and there was no further discussion. I tried numerous times to bring up changes, but each time I was told no. So what happened to me and the oth ers who spoke up? Well after making a few attempts to change things through my own stubbornness and by refusing to go along with ideas I felt were unrepresentative of the students’ desires, an example being the wire ser vice articles in the paper. As a result of my actions, I was asked to step down from being an editor to being a writer. I did so, not having much choice, be cause I needed the credits. This is what I saw happening. The staff was afraid to go against what the advisors said, because they didn’t want Editorial soon to be even more heavily armed with the promise of U.S. Apache he licopters and Bradley tanks to be de ployed in a week or so if no peace agreement can be met. The bombings on Belgrade and most recently Aleksinac are mistakes. The refugees don't want to see city infrastructures destroyed, they want to go home. Imagine Rudolph Guiliani expelling all of the native born New Jerseyans to Newark. What good would it do to bomb the Brooklyn Bridge? Troops need to be lined up along the Hudson River to stop troops from the expulsion of an innocent race. However it is too late for NATO to take these actions against Yugoslavia. While we were line to talk to a friend, you're out of luck, kid. The point is you WERE next and now you are not. Go to the back of the line. Now if you're the person that is forced to make the decision about let ting this person back in line what do you do? Do you decide against a con frontation and let the person back in line? Or, do you tell the person, "Hey you stepped out of line, it's my turn"? What is a person to do? I am very bad at confrontation and would usu ally let the person back in line. I don't want to make trouble if it's unneces sary. Then after all this time of doing that, I realize my time is valuable and it's time to tell it like it is. In the same scenario, look at it from the cashier’s point of view. Here are two customers wanting to m ■«- to disrupt anything. They didn’t even question, they just went along with it. I didn’t go along with everything and I admit I caused problems but that was because I didn’t agree with what was happening, so I was re moved. But, if changes were suggested from the outside that were not liked by some but by others would they be considered? I tried to keep things in mind that I thought students would enjoy. So some people, including myself did try to change the paper, but when we did, well, we either ended up quitting, or were demoted. So please keep this in mind, change not only has to come from outside, but also from the inside. The next topic I would like to dis cuss are the pretty strong attacks on housing over the past few weeks. Now, I do agree with some of them, but others I am just blown away by. The reason is because I don’t think people have made a fair attempt to go to housing to ask why things are done a certain way. If people asked then they may not have as much to complain about. The example, the editorial column What You Talkin ’ Bout Willis last week. The author was talking about having to be out of his room for Spring Break. Now I know it can be difficult for people who live far away, but it is known at the beginning of the year that you have to be out of your room for certain breaks. The sentence, “Now I’m sure that there is a logical explanation for them kick ing me out” can be answered in the positive. All that has to be done to answer most of the questions brought up in the editorial, is to go to Housing and ask. I am sure they will be more than happy to explain why they don’t al- ?tV\\W\SM bombing miscellaneous cities, Milosevic was completing his ethnic cleansing, which he has just about finished by now. On Tuesday, the Serbs announced a unilateral cease-fire in Kosovo, now that they have removed most of the Albanians from Kosovo. Belgrade announced that it would enforce the cease-fire through the Eastern Orthodox Easter weekend, beginning Tuesday. Another state ment also promised to allow the re turn of ethnic Albanians to Kosovo sometime in the future. However, nobody's surprised by this. "It's easier to fight Milosevic when his troops are on the rampage,” says Time U.N. correspondent William Dowell. "By purchases. The cashier sees you in line and takes your purchases when this lady announces she was next. What are they to do? Are they to believe the lady's word of being next? Are they to say that they didn’t see the lady and continue helping you? The cashier that I dealt with recently asked me if it was okay if she take care of the other lady. I said okay. The lady was checked out and then went back to talking to her friend. Maybe for problems like these we should go to a "take a number, please" way to conduct business. At some delis and other places you take a number and wait for it to be called. When the number is called it's your turn. Simple, all problems of line cutters and ladies thinking they are o <=> • o w 9 low students on campus during breaks or why there isn’t a McDonald’s or Taco Bell on campus. This lack of questioning leads me to the third thought of this editorial. Why people bitch about things they could just as easily go and ask ques tions and find answers to. There have been two A view from the lighthouse editorials making some pretty strong accusations. One was, once again, against housing and the computer center was under attack in the other. In one of the articles they attacked housing for telling stu dents to be off campus during breaks and then handing out hotels in the area. The other was about the laser printer in the library and having to pay for it. Both of these articles ask ques tions that can be answered. Ex amples from the current, ’’Where was the sense of logic?,” article about the laser printer and printout cards are Why can’t the card be bought in the library? Why does it need to be bought at Hammermill or the RUB Desk? Well all that has to be done to answer those questions is to go to the computer lab and ask. I have done it, why can’t you? I have a feeling that if the author(s) of both of these editorials would have just gone and asked the same questions of the right authori ties they would have gotten answers. However, if they did they probably wouldn’t have had anything to write about for the paper. Lastly, I have one general ques tion for the Beacon. Who does write the A view from the lighthouse edi torials? Numerous times I have heard people talk about and wonder who writes them. When I was on staff they were supposed to be staff editorials, meaning they represented the voice TON STIJBBS nothing suing for peace he raises the po litical pressure on NATO to settle and make a bad deal. And the way this has gone for the Kosovars may make it harder for the allies to maintain their bombing campaign." So whether the bombing cam paign worked or not ( we have yet to find out), it was a bad strategy. The ground war should not be counted out just yet either. When Milosevic backs out on this re cently proposed agreement, NATO's ego will step in and begin bombing again. Jon Stubbs is the features editor of the Bea con. His column appears every three weeks. SHANNON WEBER well, maybe. Until that same lady declares, she didn't hear her num ber being called. Then we start from square one. There are a few exceptions I would be willing to make. If the person in front of me forgot some thing and just asked me if I minded if they ran back to get it, I would wait and let them finish. Or if I have the time to waste I would let that lady step back in line to buy her items. For the most part, though enough is enough. That was the last time I am letting it happen to me. Line cutters, beware! Shannon Weber is the news editor of the Beacon. Her column appears every' three of the whole staff, but they usually ended up being just one or two people’s opinion and not everyone’s. Now I think that out First Amendment right is a great one and that you should be able to bitch and complain about whatever you would like. But I also think if you are not afraid to put your thoughts in writing, that you should also not be afraid to put your name on it. If it is a staff editorial like in some papers then alright, but even so, grow some cahonies and put your or the paper’s name on the edito rial. The USA Today in their edi torials at least puts the words, “Our view,” near it. At least that way people know who to respond to if they write a response to the article. I wrote an article about Greeks and hazing last year. As if the sub ject wasn’t bad enough not only was it on the front page, but it was also in the issue that went out dur ing rush week. I thought that what I was writing about was worth the press. And, even though, I’m sure, Greeks all across campus wanted to kick my face in, I still put my name on it. So, if you have something to say, be proud and admit that you said it. If it is the whole staff’s view say so, that is all I ask, because I am sure readers would not mind knowing who is the keeper of the lighthouse. Mike DeSantis 08 MIS
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