Amy Wilczynski, editorial page editor
The Behrend Beacon
/ ';'' 1 //\ J ,• I IJ\ /,, v/;,,/, /;/\ ,1/ / //// S/r//< ///( . / //r /.’< 111, a,I ( , ’Hi l.'i
News Editors
Jusf/n Curry
Angela Szesciorka
Sports Editors
Kevin Fiorenzo
Amy Frizzell
Editorial Page Editor
Amy Wilczynski
Features Editor
Dana Vaccaro
Adviser
Beacon Crt * L ""*" , - a
, Copy Editors
Staff Photographers Professionalism with a Carolyn M. Tellers
JeffHankey personality” Kristin Bowers
Heather Myers
Greek Life Editor
Courtney Straub
Penn State Erie,
the Behrend College;
First Floor, The J. Elmer Reed Union Building,
Think the Beacon
pages need some
THEN JOIN THE TEAM
The Beacon is looking for
writers for the fall semester
No need lo loin a class
Just write as much as your
schedule allows
Express your interest by
e-mailing Ban Stasiewski at
djs39s@psu.edu
Editor in Chief
Lauren M. Packer
Managing Editor
Daniel J. Stasiewski
Assistant Managing Editor
Scott Soltis
Station Road, Erie, PA 16563
Contact The Beacon at:
Telephone: (814) 898-6488
Fax: (814) 898-6019
ISSN 1071-9288.
spiceP
EDITORIAL
Advertising Manager
Ryan Russell
Calendar Page Editor
Rob Frank
A&E Editor
Daniel J. Stasiewski
Erika Jarvis
Supplemental Editor
Lauren M. Packer
Friday, April 23, 2004
We are more than just Penn State
It’s that time of year again. Caps
and gowns are hanging on dorm room
doors, waiting for commencement day.
Finals are putting the squeeze on al
ready drained brains. And, of course,
graduating seniors are preparing to
give up $lOO for the senior gift,
Behrend’s own Nittany lion statue.
Yep, a Nittany lion, just like the one
in front of Old Main. It’s a part of the
university’s identity, much like the way
swastika was part of the Nazi identity.
Now, Behrend seniors again are fol
lowing the leader like good little lem
mings to plant a one-ton slab of rock
that resembles an ficticious mountain
lion on this campus.
Granted, Behrend’s Penn State af
filiation has its perks. I can borrow
pretty much any foreign film and indie
flick on DVD from any other univer
sity library. (Behrend seems to forget
the arts part of a liberal arts education,
at least with respect to film.) The
online journals subscriptions and
speedy Internet also have their advan
tages.
But as far as I’m concerned, I didn’t
go to University Park, where the mas-
cot is a Nittany lion. I’m at Behrend.
You know, “the small college, with the
big degree.” Last time I checked, our
mascot (pathetic as it may be) was the
lion. The large feline with a mane, not
the overgrown house cat. We may be
Penn State, but we sure as hell aren’t
Nittany lions.
So why put a Nittany lion statue on
our campus? Is it to remind Behrend
students that there’s an Oz-like univer-
Make students earn a communication deuree
Perhaps the hardest lesson I’ve had
to learn during my four years at
Behrend was coming to grips with the
fact that my Communication and Me
dia Studies degree is worthless.
Come May 15,1 will have a degree
that cost me thousands of dollars, yet
have nothing to show for it.
I say this because of the current state
of the Communication program. I have
better than a 3.5 in my major, and a 3.6
overall. Yet, when you compare what
I am able to produce to other students
in the communication field, I look pa
thetic.
What I’m lacking is what other com
munication majors have: an education.
It’s no wonder the Communication
major is the most criticized by other stu
dents. They, along with the students in
the major, see what’s happening. They
see that our classes and workloads are
fake. It’s no secret that Communica
tion majors do little to no work. Look
at our major checksheet for proof. The
highest prescribed course we have to
take, besides our internship, is Commu
421 W. Compare that to English, which
is Elish 494 A or Operations Manage
ment, which is 470 W.
Don’t feed me the bull about students
must be willing to be dedicated and
work outside of the classroom. Don’t
lt has been called to
my attention that re
cently on campus
there has been more
and more people wear
ing Greek letters. No,
these are not people
who are part of the
three Greek sororities,
five Greek fraternities,
many Honors fraterni
ties, or Community
Service fraternities,
but actually they are
non-Greeks who have
never been recognized
by the campus. It is a
bit ironic that the
people who ridicule Greek life at
this campus are the ones actually
making up “fake frats” or wearing
Greek letters. These people said
they have such shirts with Greek
letters, numbers, and nicknames be-
Daniel J. Stasiewski
sity somewhere over the rainbow that
is better than the gray Behrend Col
lege because there are more bars? Or
is it because there are so many UP
rejects on campus that a Nittany lion
statue is like the bottle of Centrum vi-
tamins contestants not appearing on
stage receive when they can’t estimate
cost on “The Price is Right?”
Usually I’d give a serious stab at
the real motivation around this point
in my column, but I just don’t get it.
I don’t see why Behrend needs to
kneel at the altar of University Park,
when, let’s face it, the large central
Pennsylvania campus seems a tad bit
concerned with little old Behrend, as
it finishes the construction of one new
residence hall, with another in the
planning stage, to accommodate the
influx of new students. I’m sure any
body in the English Department
would be able to vouch for the domi
nation through bureaucracy. The fac
ulty behind the newly offered BFA in
Lauren Pi
editor in chief
feed me the bull about how our edu
cation is only as great as what effort
we put forth
I’ve worked with the Beacon for
four semesters, serving as editor in
chief for two, but it’s still not enough.
I belong to outside trade organiza
tions such as the Association for
Women in Communication. I’ve
done an internship, toured newspa
pers and volunteered with numerous
organizations.
I don’t claim to be a Pulitzer Prize
winning author, and I know I have
many faults with my writing. But I
came to Behrend with an insatiable
quest for knowledge about the Com
munication field, ready and willing
to spend the long hours crafting my
cause “they like to drink together”
or to make fun of the fraternities
here. They did not even know
what the actual Greek letters were
on their shirts. I learned that some
of these shirts that people suppos
edly wear for drinking are an ac
tual underground organization. I
have not heard much that they do
except for hazing including binge
drinking, smoking weed, and etc.
to “initiate” the new members.
Hazing is illegal and no matter
who you are, whether a Greek or
ganization, varsity team, club sport
or etc. Hazing is not allowed and
in Pennsylvania it is considered a
misdemeanor of the third degree.
Another problem is 1 don’t think
people realize you can’t put a
couple Greek letters on a shirt and
say you are a frat. Did you ever
check and see if there was really a
Greek fraternity named that al
The Behrend Beacon
creative writing,a Behrend College ex
clusive in the Penn State system, had to
jump through more hoops than a trained
dolphin at Sea World in order to get the
university to accept the degree program.
If Erie city and county officials ever
get their acts together, Behrend will
have an even greater potential for suc
cess, success that is only limited by the
bureaucrats at University Park. While
I’d like to believe it matters that the cer
tificate I’ll have next year is a Penn State
University degree, I’d be willing to
give-up that university name-dropping
up for a little bit of Behrend pride. I’m
not just talking going to basketball
games or wearing a shirt with PSB on
it. Students should take pride in the
classes, in the community and in the fact
that our mascot is a lion.
Behrend is only as strong as its stu
dents. By placing a monument to some
thing we are not on this campus, stu
dents are only showing their weakness.
I may not be a senior this year, but if
the same fund-raiser for a statue is still
going on next April, that rock better
have a mane on it. Otherwise, I’ll show
my strength. I’ll be spending my $lOO
on a wig.
Note: Creative writing program chair
George Looney, who talked with me a
bit about he BFA program, wanted to
make sure Dr. Jack Burke received
credit for his work on making the cre
ative writing degree a reality. I, too,
would like to take a moment to thank
Dr. Burke for being the advocate that
this campus needs to succeed.
Communication skills, and received
close to nothing in return.
I have learned some skills while in
the Communication program, but not
much. And when the editor in chief of
the school’s newspaper has to set the
record straight because the faculty and
staff have the wool pulled over their
eyes, it’s a shame.
To be frank, I’m not even sure I will
be able to look people in the eye and
tell them I graduated from college with
a degree. That’s how ashamed I am of
my skills that I supposedly “learned”
during my stay.
We want to do the work; that's why
we are here. We want to learn, we want
to get better. We want to learn how to
write. We want to learn how to perform
public relations campaigns. We want
to make videos and produce newspa
per clips. No one says they are going
to college so they can waste thousands
of dollars on a bogus degree.
Faculty, rise to the challenge: make
Communication and Media Studies
majors earn their degree. Don’t just
hand it to them; it benefits no one. I'm
tired of having to defend my major
choice to the business majors, to the en
gineers, to the biology majors, to every
other major on this campus. The cur
rent state of our program has left us the
laughing stock of the campus.
ready? No, 1 am not out to put
down these people because I would
be a hypocrite, but I am just trying
to make a point about how every
one at this campus bashes the
Greek Life here and does not re
ally know the whole truth. I am
proud to say that my organization
has never “hazed” any of our new
sisters and we treat our new mem
bers like equals and no not all we
do is drink. We participate in a
variety of philanthropies and ac
tivities on this campus and we take
our academics very seriously. So
next time you go to make fun of
anyone on this campus you should
step back and as they say “take a
walk in their shoes for a day” and
realize the good in them.
Natalie Lytle, Biobd, 06
Page