I The Behrend Beacon
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or
the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances. - The First Ammendment to the U.S. Constitution
Sheep Lust for Sheepskin : The Penn State Experience
With a slip of the tongue only possibly inside a bureaucracy
as extensive as Penn State. some marketing stooge has managed
to undermine the supposed "higher" value of higher education
with two simple words. How so I'm told that when new fac
ulty members are going through orientation at our fine univer
sity, the terms "consumer - and "product" are often used in
place of "student - and "degree." I believe this inadvertantlyre
veals a greater truth about Penn State and higher education as a
whole. Isn't the aim of college to challenge young minds to
reach new heights. to become exposed to new ways of thinking,
to have some consciousness expanding, "Dead Poet's Society"
kind of experience? Or has college education become reduced
to a lunch line that you passively cycle through, pay your bill
and get a stamp on your forehead that reads "Mechanical
Engineer" or "Publicist" just for being a good enough sport to
stick around long enough? Have I just outlined an argument
with ridiculous extremes? Am I over-reacting? I would be. That
is, if there wasn't considerable evidence to back me up.
How many classes have you been privy to in which a profes
sor practically begs for student/consumer participation? I've
had a quite a few. Whether the class size is 12 or 120, no one
answers questions. No one participates. It is truly pitiful to see
a faculty member, who has spent a lifetime accruing knowledge
and experience, struggle in vain to engender a spark of partici
pation in a room full of disinterested youths which are suppos
edly at their prime.
This is not entirely the fault of the administration, students
share the blame for this abysmal state of affairs, however I con
tend that the university is largely responsible and I'll get to
them in a second, but first, let's talk about the student body.
Students are human. That's no crime. We can be distracted,
tired. burnt out or simply bored. Whatever the mitigating cir
cumstances, the current state of disinterest I see people express
ing in their own education goes far beyond the sum of all
human weaknesses.
It's true that not all of those 120 or even 12 students "should
he here." "College has become the new high school," "college
has become trade school;" I'm sure you've heard clichés like
these that apparently describe the nature of modern higher edu
cation. Like most clichés, they hold an element of truth. More
students are enrolled in college now than ever before. It is
Beacon Thumbs Up
- Three day weekends.
- Courteous students who hold doors for
others.
- Two-liters of your pop in Brunos.
Beacon Thumbs Down
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- Deep puddles on rainy walkways.
Early morning lawnmowers outside
dorm windows.
-The career fair being held far from the
center of campus in the Junker center.
By Chris Hvizdak
opinion editor
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OPINION
almost impossible to secure a living-wage job
without a college diploma. Consequently, every
one needs a sheepskin. America has supposedly
shifted from an industrial economy to an informa
tion economy. Because of this shift in the work
force, I think it's fair to say that there are far more
"sheepskin fiends" who merely want to get their
hand stamped so they can "Pass Go" and get a
decent job than students who actually seek to
become educated. End result: lack of class partici
pation and thusly the passive travesty that is high
er education.
So what is a university to do? A gallant institu
tion of higher learning might grab the bull by the
horns and structure rigorous majors that require all
of their graduates to develop analytical skills and
study the foundations of modern thought, so that
their graduates would instinctively entertain multi
ple viewpoints on any given issue, have a solid
understanding of the ways of the world and be
keenly armed to better society. Or a university
could simply "go with the flow" and pander to the
lowest common denominator to give the people
what they want. Such a university would issue a
type of passive, assembly line, cookie-cutter
degree. This would not be a cherished and
admirable institution that gave the people what
they needed rather than what they wanted. This
would be a flophouse of "education" that passed
out product to anyone with cash. To add insult to
injury such a university could arrogantly admit to
doing so and that would be simply atrocious. And
so vanishes the wizard in ,a puff of pomp and circumstance,
leaving only a nasty little man ruled by the piOfit motive
writhing behind the curtain.
Too harsh? Naah. I don't mind hurting Spainer's feelings.
I've met a lot of great students and faculty as well as a few awe
some administrators in my Penn State career. It's not their fault
that society at large and the Penn State bureaucracy set a tone
so hostile to higher learning. A lot of readers my take me as a
whiney "blame the institution liberal" and up until this point
you could fairly conclude that. Hold your fire for a second there
my right-winged friends, I've got a dose of "self reliance" con
servatism on the way.
For all of you who have conquered academic passivism and
Furniture follies
If you've ever gone into the apartments on campus
then you know the furniture that fills them is in pretty
bad shape. There are grooves in the cushions and
springs of the chairs and the couchish type thing.
Cuddling on them is next to impossible because the
grooves have already predetermined where you are to
sit. When you do choose to sit on the cusp of one of
these grooves, you feel like you're going to fall into a
canyon.
It is to the point where most students bring their
own couches and chairs. Or if nothing else, cover
them up with towels and blankets. The sight of them
alone makes a person want to barf; maybe that's why
they're so dirty looking. Upon closer inspection, you
will notice the discoloration of said furniture. It is
most often a weird brownish color. It looks like last
nights rager threw up all over the furniture. Or at
least had a few beers spilled on it. If someone were to
cut it open, I can only imagine the filth they would
find.
Also, I am surprised that the lamps still give off
light. The light bulbs get changed, but the shades are
detestable. The grossness of the lamp shades is wors
ened and illuminated when the lights are turned on.
They look like they've been inside the house of some
one who lived until he or she was 200 years old,
smoked every day of his or her life and was unable to
clean.
Submission Guidelines
The Beacon welcomes readers to share their
views on this page
Letters and commentary pieces can be submitted
by email to opinion@psu.edu or directly to the
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Letters should be limited to 350 words and com
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ZACK MENTZ
By Jennifer Haight
news editor
jahloos psu.edu
The Behrend Beacon
„nu St a t e
Biffi
eacon Assistant News Edina
Patrick Webster
Penn State Erie,
The Behrend College Contact the Beacon at:
First Floor, The J. Elmer Reed Telephone: (814) 898-6488
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Quote of the Week
"Friendship is but another name
for an alliance with the follies and
the misfortunes of others. Our own
share of miseries is sufficient: why
enter then as volunteers into those
of another ?"
managed to read this far, I will now, in a 'departing senior' type
fashion, reveal the secret of higher education.
To put it simply, college is what you make of it. You've heard
that before. Let me lay it out like it is. Show up get your card
punched and get your degree but make college work for you. In
my numerous years at Penn State I've switched campus,
switched majors, burned all my late drop credits and tacked on
a few minors to boot. But in that time I've also lost 165 lbs.,
developed extra-circular skills in all the digital arts, shepherd
ed my own feature film through pre-production, production and
now post-production and generally had a fine time of it all. I
like to think of higher education as a government subsidized
reprieve from a full time job that allows me to develop and pur
sue what it is I'm trul interested in. I've made colle e work for
in the apartments
The bathrooms are a whole other ball game. The
shower floors are so uneven that the water doesn't
drain because the lowest part of the floor is below the
drain, resulting in puddles and weird smells. I am
scared to sit on the toilet seats because some of them
have cracks in them and I always fear that my bottom
will get pinched.
beds and dressers in the bedrooms, but these are hard
ly the rooms where most of the social gatherings take
place. It is quite embarrassing when someone who
lives in the Behrend apartments invites someone from
a different school over for the weekend and that per
son doesn't want to sit on the furniture in fear of con
tracting some weird kind of fungus.
Next to the bedrooms, the kitchens are the most liv
able rooms in the apartments. The tables and chairs
are plain wood with no cushions to break. There are
also new refrigerators which add a nice touch, but do
not take attention away from the living room furniture
or the bathrooms.
To live in the apartments, it costs $4140 per year;
the apartments are equipped to house 288 students. So
in a year, the school makes $1,192,320 on just the
room and board from the students living in the apart
ments. I don't think it is unreasonable to invest in
some new fixtures for the apartments.
When purchased in bulk, I am sure that the school
would get a hefty discount on new furniture. Why not
make the investment? It would be highly appreciated
by the students and may even encourage more people
to want to live on campus.
All submissions must include the writer's year in
school, major and name as The Beacon does not
publish anonymous letters.
Deadline for any submission is 5 p.m. Tuesday
afternoon for inclusion in the Friday issue. All sub
missions are considered, but because of space limi
tations, some may not be published.
All submissions must include consent to be edit
ed before they can be edited for publication.
Friday, October 14, 2005
Annie Sevin. Editor in Chief
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Okay, so most of the apartments have new desks,
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