PAGE TWO
You know, it's funny about educational systems, particularly
large universities. There I was, sitting in Marketing Research,
learning all there is to know about how the customer is right, and
how businesses spend millions of dollars each year seeking out the
customer to find out what he wants. The idea is to give the
customer what he wants.
Then I open my Master Schedule and I see a list of classes which
are given to us, with no regard to what we want, and with no active
research dedicated to finding out what we want. As customers,
we. are paying over $lOOO a year (including fees, parking, books,
and sometimes housing) to a company which couldn't care less
about our wants, and which dictates our needs.
I can't argue about the University dictating our academic needs,
since, after all, they are much more learned persons than I, and
they should know what we will need to know. Registration has
been upgraded and is much better, but their product is only as
good as whatever they get from the various faculty divisions. So,
why aren't we consulted concerning our wants?
By wants, I mean, why isn't there a research study to find out
what listed classes should be offered during a particular term,
how often, and when? Why must we accept the dictates of
professors who don't have to worry about balancing jobs, classes,
requirements, and extra-curricular activities? Why are students
signing up for classes which are then cancelled two days later for
some unknown superfluous reason, and finding themselves with
schedules like periods 1,4, & 5 or 1,5, & 6?
Why? Because no one has seriously asked us what we want, with
the intent of following the results of such research when
scheduling.
Dr. Wayne Lee, head of the Undergraduate Business program,
has pointed out that such a survey was indeed conducted for
Business classes for the last summer term, and the results were
inconclusive and unreliable. Perhaps. But this survey was taken in
the middle of the Winter term for a Summer that few students
could be sure about.
What I propose is simple: prepare and utilize surveys which can
be administered early in the term preceding the term they are for
(Example: early Winter for Spring). Administer the forms to the
students in their major area of concentration. Computerize the
forms for quicker and easier tabulation, and use the results in
formulating the class schedules. Of course, faculty discretion can
be used in the final preparation of the schedule, but only to a
limited extent. After all, it's nothing any other successful business
wouldn't do.
The Capitol Canopus Reader
' The C. C. Reader is published by the students of the
Pennsylvania State University at Capitol Campus,
Middletown, Pa., and is printed by the Middletown
Press & Journal during the Fall, Winter and Spring
Terms.
Opinions expressed by the editors and staff are not
necessarily those of the University Administration,
Faculty or Students.
Editor-in-Chief
Associate Editor
Associate & Photography Editor
Business Manager
Sports Editor
Sports
Staff
Romeo Traianus, Ronnie Wer, Lynn Kramer,
Frank Daloisio, Phyllis Schaeffer, Patrick McClure,
P.R.J. Smith, Mike Mitchell
Doug & Jim & Frank & Phyllis
Mike McAllister, Russ Hogg
DayrNicholas
.. Diane Cressler
Jim Ferrier
Dr. Betty Thorne
Layout
SGA Correspondents
Hot Lion Coordinator
Graphics
Advisor
Faculty Advisor ....
Are
They
Right?
- 14, e
it-^NO
- . e
•
• •
Jim Bollinger
Doug Gibboney
Fred Prouser
Ken Hession
Horace Jones
Joe Minnici, Gene T. Eddy
C. C. READER
Decisive Moment
Photography
As A Means
Of
Self-expression
By Fred Prouser
Today we are visually
assaulted by countless images
either on television, the
movies, in advertising or in the
people we come in contact with
each day. After awhile, the
mind boggles at this massive
influx and just starts to store
all this perceived imagery in
the subconscious.
Through the medium of
photography, one can sort out
the myraid of images that
assault our eyes and make a
coherent, tangible and very
personal statement about one's
perceptions of the world.
The themes of photography
are as varied as life itself.
Subject matter can be as
simple as a wooden bridge in a
ravine to the abstract quality
inherent in light poles. People
make great subjects too. Using
available light, the
photographer can catch people
unawares- portraying a true
image of themselves which is
almost always unobtainable
with flash photography.
The subconscious elements
of photography arise after a
considerable body of work has
been accumulated and various
themes and elements of
compositional style evolve
with regularity. It is at this
point that you can sit down and
'try to figure out what your
photographs are saying or
continue shooting, satisfied
that the images stand on their
own merits without any heavy
psychoanalysing.
The term "decisive
moment" was coined by the
famous French photographer
Henri Cartier- Bresson and can
-J.S.B
personal terms. It is a feeling
of tension and intense con
centration. It can on occasion
bring on a sense of abandon in
which a whole roll of film can
be used up in less than a
minute. During this
"moment", the viewfinder
becomes the photographer's
world. Everything but the
image is filtered out. As the
shutter is pressed and the film
exposed to light- the begin
nings of a photographic image
start to form.
The image is very
vulnerable. It is conceived in
light, but given birth to in
darkness and wetness. It is
brought to its fulfillment as the
print with light and wetness. It
is ironic that too much light
can obliterate the image
forever.
Monochrome or the splashy
gaudiness of Kodachrome, film
choice further varies the
photographer's means of
expression. Advancements in
technology have made it
possible to photograph
(Continued On Page 8)
The
Nixon Never Caught Up
When a man tumbles for a year, his sense of balance is sorely
upset. But equally important, those who are his followers are
literally upset. The tumble of Richard Nixon has left a politically
tired people modestly hoping for the spring of a new beginning.
Although Nixon's fall has its historical, political and moral
causes, there is also a more subtle level we can easily miss. Let
me call it an "artistic" cause.
Part of the investment which Americans have made in their
president is that we expect him to be more than a politically or
legislatively "good" president. An unwritten expectation placed
on an American president is that he speak to the dreams and hopes
of his people. As the human body needs a mouth, so the political
body needs a mouth to articulate what the whole body feels. If that
articulation does not occur, there is frustration.
We have no right to this expectation of a president, nor is it the
law, nor would it necessarily be there. But it is present, and is part
of the reality of American culture and politics.
John Kennedy did not accomplish the legislation of Lyndon
Johnson nor of Richard Nixon; but Kennedy articulated the hopes
and dreams of a generation, he had a sense of poetry and an ear
which allowed him to catch the moods of the times in which he
lived. He fulfilled a quality of the presidency we expect - he ar
ticulated something of the moods of the country.
Mr. Nixon's failure to be touched by some of the deeper
American moods of the past six years has extracted a large price
of frustration from the people he was elected to govern. His is an
artistic failure to move beyond a quantitative interest in a people.
It is easy to understand why frustration escalates when one
remembers Saturday, November 15th, 1969: the largest political
rally in the history of the United States took place outside Mr.
Nixon's backyard to oppose American involvement in the Vietnam
War. Nixon chose to watch television with Ohio State playing
football.
In the January 3rd, 1972 issue of Time, Mr. Nixon, the Man of the
Year, stated in an interview with Jerrold Schecter, "So I never
start the morning by reading through the Washington Post or the
New York Times. I wouldn't start by looking at Herblock. I know
that when I have to make a decision I must be disciplined."
Allen Drury and Fred Maroon in their book, "Courage and
Hesitation," quote Nixon as saying, "I have never called a
publisher, never called an editor, never called a reporter, on the
carpet. I don't care. And you know...that's what makes 'em mad.
That's what infuriates 'em. I just don't care."
In a world characterized by growing expectations, new patterns
of life, shifting loyalties and accelerated social change, one's
confidence is not strengthened by a president who exhibits his lack
of feeling in so many ways.
There is no question that Mr. Nixon was, or could be, well in
formed. One of the facts of life today is that information is readily
available. Instant communication in a variety of forms allows a
president, or a candidate for that office, to know the necessary
data on any subject.
But the question I raise is not simply one of knowing the facts or
getting the information. There is a level to the human political
animal which is not intellectual, but has to do with moods, tem
perament, a feel for life, an awareness of the constant ebb and
flow of a nation.
Part of this problem for Mr. Nixon is built into his office. Given
the society in which we live, the President must be protected. But
each time another guard is placed at the White House (Eastern,
Southern, or Western), or the motor scooter brigade is increased,
or the Executive Protective Service is beefed up, or harder
screening occurs in the areas of communication - then the
president may be better protected and his time used more ef
ficiently. But he also becomes more fully isolated.
A price tag comes with that protection, and the price is the
greater possibility of a loss of touch by the president; not loss of
knowledge, but loss of touch and the "truth" that comes with that
touch. Nixon's natural bent to isolation combined with heavy
protection, had to result in an isolated president.
The tumble of Richard Nixon will be analyzed for years to come.
Writers and experts will gradually sift out the numerous factors
which brought about this sad event in American Political History.
But for this writer, and I suspect for a great number of American
people, a basic cause was that quite literally, Nixon lost touch.
Despite his technical capacity for the job, Nixon's growing sense
of arrogance was felt by even his most staunch supporters from
the '72 election. The recurring blunders ranging from burglaries
and grain deals to tax write offs and a convicted vice-president, all
forming the web of Watergate, confirm the impression that Mr.
Nixon learned nothing and he forgot nothing.
At one point in his life the leader of India, Mahatma Ghandi said,
"I must catch up with my people, I am their leader." Mr. Nixon
never caught up. It was inevitable that like excess weight, he be
dropped off.
This article originally appeared in the Harrisburg In
dependent Press August 23, 1974. The writer is a graduate
student at Penn State Capitol Campus.
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OCTOBER 25, 1974
By Richard Marold