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EDITORIAL
Apathy On Campus
Once again, apathy has prevailed in the true Capitol
Campus tradition. Recent SGA elections showed a
graduate student voting contigency of exactly 7
graduate students. Not a very favorable showing from a
group which last year exerted enough influence and
effort to have an amendment passed to the SGA
constitution allowing graduate students to vote in SGA
elections.
The question is: after all the work involved in such
a cause and in an election which showed the best voter
turnout in years, where were the graduate students
who so badly wanted the vote?
Were these students aware that they had the right
to vote? Or as graduate students, did they feel they
were not affected enough by the activities of the SGA
to take part in the selection of next year’s government?
If lack of knowledge is the reason for the small
percentage of graduate votes, perhaps the blame lies in
the system of communications here at Capitol.
There is no central general information point for
students. Information for each program is posted on
several and various bulliten boards throughout the
Main Building. There is no way of relaying information
to the whole student body except through the student
newspaper, and due to this year’s physical and
financial limitations, it’s not feasible, to publish the
Reader more than twice a month.
There must be some way to pool the resources of
the school to find an effective system of
communication. Until we do, apathy will continue to be
the only activity on this campus that all students are
willi' ' in.
My wife and l drove in
from Philadelphia to witness
Capitol’s Black Cultural Arts
Festival (April 4-10). Arriving
late and upon hearing this
strong electrifying voice
singing “Deep River”, which
is a very old Black spiritual, I
could not get up the steps to
the auditorium fast enough.
Being a ardent follower of
gospel music and the
performing arts, I gloried in
what I was experiencing for
free.
I don’t know what I
expected in the way of
response to the concert or
the festival, but as we
entered the auditorium my
wife asked: “Where are all
the people, the faculty, the
students?” I could only
reply, “I don’t know.” I do
know this, it is sad when you
The Capitol Campus Reader
The Pennsylvania State University
The Capitol Campus
Middletown, Pennsylvania 17057
ph. 717-944-4970
The C.C. Reader is published by the students at Capitol
Campus every two weeks during the fall, winter and spring
terms. Printing is done at the Middletown Press and Journal.
The Reader office is located in W-129, Main Building.
The opinions expressed in this newspaper do not
necessarily represent the views of the students, faculty or
staff of Capitol Campus or The Pennsylvania State
University.
Paid advertisements in the Reader are not necessarily
endorsed by the editors or staff.
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Is Criticized
have entertainers or per
formers of the caliber I
witnessed on Sunday, and
they get the mediocre
response those young peo
ple received.
I began to wonder,
“Where are the school
administrators, counselors,
students, and instructors?” I
fail to see how an event of
this magnitude could take
pftce without at least the
support of the enlightened
faculty, the guidance of the
counselors and the leader
ship of the administrators of
the university. Where were
the sponsers of the seminars
or group encounters dealing
specifically with prejudice
and racism, that .were held
on Thursday and Friday? I
might add, attendance at
these too, were sparse, and
Paul Bailla, Social Committee Chaliman
Dr. Melvyn Haber
Deborah Young, Mike Barnett,
Karan Pickens, Robert L. Flatter Jr.
C.C. Reader
What Value Has A
College Degree?
Until recent years, the
rewards of a college
education were clearly evi
dent: “better” jobs at higher
pay and greater social
prestige. However, the
failure to achieve expected
rewards has caused many
people to question the worth
of a college education and to
ask what college is for.
Since 1969, the advan
tage in starting salary a
college graduate could ex
pect over other members of
the labor force has fallen
from 24 per cent to
approximately six per cent.
In 1969, the lifetime
income advantage a recent
graduate could expect was
about 11 per cent. By 1974,
it had fallen to seven per
tOl ii.
A recent “Newsweek”
article entitled “Who needs
College?” estimated that 27
per cent of the nation’s work
force is made up of people
who are “overeducated” for
'ibs thr hold.
judging from Sunday, un
productive.
This lack of support of
the festival’s opening con
cert serves to reinforce my
feelings that the seminars
accomplished nothing and
represent the token concern
for racial harmony and
understanding that can only
be accomplished by people
interaction by the university.
Here was an opportunity
to gain some insight into the
Black experience and what
we are about, to share in a
cultural experience that
would have had Frank Rizzo
and George Wallace patting
their feet and clapping their
hands just celebrating .the
joy of life and witnessing a
most enriching and fulfilling
experience.
Those of you hold your
precious degrees of learning
so sacred don’t forget, that
to be human is to be forever
learning. In any teaching or
instructional process, ex
amples must be made and
set.
Capitol Campus, you set
a fine example of hospitality
and appreciation to those
graduates and students of
this campus who partici
pated in Sunday’s concert
and the young people in the
groups who danced and
sang their hearts out for
those of us in the audience.
One of the groups led by
a graduate of this campus
sang a very moving rendition
of “I Believe.” As I reflect on
the poor support shown in
the lack of attendance to the
opening of the Black
Cultural Arts Festival, I find
myself thinking of a line in
that song that says, “I
believe, I know why I
believe.”
Dave Williams
Humanities, 9th term
They cited as examples a
Phi Beta Kappa University of
Colorado graduate with
degrees in both sociology
and psychology who is
working as a restaurant
manager and a Ph.D. in
English who is now a welder
in Kansas City, Kansas.
The tremendous increase
in the enrollments of career
or practically-oriented ma
jors--accounting, engi
neering, journalism—leaves
little doubt that most
student see their degree as a
license to practice in a
particular field.
This career-orientation
-has been reflected in a
narrowing of interests on the
part of students who don't
want any part of anything
that is not directly related to
their major.
We can see this business
We can see this in
business students who don’t
want course work outside of
business areas or engineers
who would like to devote
four years of work solely to
engineering.
Such an orientation goes
against the traditional idea
that college is supposed to
be a broadening experience
which provides the tools to
handle a wide diversity
of life’s problems.
It used to be that if you
hired a college graduate, you
could expect to get someone
who was literate, mathe
matically qualified and had a
basic intelligence about
what society was all about.
This is no longer necessarily
true.
Today’s graduates tend
to be highly competent and
FacultyJ'orum
informed in their specialized
area but lack insight into any
other field. There are many
college students who do not
have an eighth-grade
competence level in such
basic skills as reading,
writing and arithmetic.
The single-minded pur
suit of what is practical or
career oriented results in
speciality idiots, competent
only in their narrow area of
expertise.
This may be good for
finding jobs initially, but it is
not conducive to promota
bility or the handling of the
wide range of problems
that are certain to occur.
Despite the current em
ployment problems of liberal
arts graduates, many edu
cators insist that such
students are, on the average,
much better prepared to
survive and grow with the
seven job changes and three
career changes that the
average American goes
through in a lifetime.
Colleges and universities
face the dilemma of how to
avoid the Scylla of being too
narrowly oriented without
being drawn into the
Charybdis of being too
broad.
While a narrow compe
tence limits your future
chances for promotion, such
chances are not too bright if
April 29, *1976
Lola Dudley
you can’t get a job now
because your orientation is
too broad.
The solution to this
dilemma rests ultimately
with the student since it is
he or she who stands to gain
or lose the most. Of
necessity, this dictates a
great deal of effort on the
part of students, faculty and
administration to determine
the needs of the student and
how best to meet them.
The first question that
must be answered in
determining student needs
is: Does he/she really want
to go to college, now or
ever?
With 47 per cent of 18
and 19-year-olds in college,
one can not help but
conclude that some of them
really don’t belong in college
at all or that they might
benefit by a “cooling off
period.”
The “Wall Street Journal”
quotes a 17-year-old plan
ning to major in elementary
education as saying, “I
decided not to take a year off
and try to work because I
was afraid my interest in
college might slacken.”
If one’s interest in
college “slackens,” is that
bad?
A university has a certain
responsibility to provide
relevant information to stu
dents so that they may make
informed decisions. But, in
the final analysis, the
selection of major and work
emphasis is the student’s.
If one chooses to major
in Renaissance poetry with
full knowledge of job
opportunities, or lack of
same, in that area, failure to
find employment in that field
upon graduation should not
elicit statements as to the
“lousy school” or the
“wasted effort.”
Likewise, if one wishes
to “do my own thing” while
in school by taking very
narrowly oriented courses
such as “The Machivellian
Implications of the Star Trek
Phenomenon,” he/she has
no cause for complaint if no
one will hire him/her.
We are, after all, talking
about adults, making adult
decisions. Such decisions
don’t always have the
desired outcome, but they
have to be lived with
nevertheless.
The primary function of a
university should be to
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