opinions
"editoiiql opin ion . ,
Playing it straight
For some coaches and student athletes at
Penn State, the first weeks of this semester
have been ones of anxiety and waiting.
Are they worried about a big game or
match coming up against a tough team?
Are they thinking about a tournament that
could put them in the running for a national
championship? Things should be so simple.
The source of their anxiety lies with the
University's waffling over the fate of
grants-in-aid for 10 teams.
Using various criteria, including partici
pation in these sports on the high school
level in Pennsylvania, the University Inter
collegiate Athletic Strategic Planning Com
mittee recommended in November that
athletic scholarships for three athletic pro
grams men's volleyball and men's and
women's lacrosse squads should be fro
zen and these teams should not continue
recruiting.
The committee also recommended that
men's and women's fencing should not
receive scholarships in the future, even
though these sports have not received schol
arships since 1981.
Softball, men's and women's golf and
men's and women's tennis programs will
also receive grants for the first time since
1981, under the committee's recommenda
tions.
However, these recommendations have
yet to be approved.
In fact, no further information on the
status of the recommendations was pro
vided until last week when University Vice
President for Financial Operations Steve
Garban said, "We kind of discussed the
matter and we agreed that we should imple
ment the new priorities or at least give the
coaches notice that we are thinking about
it:"
The committee's recommendations were
sent to Athletic Director James I. Tarman,
who then sent them to Garban for approval.
deify Collegian
Wednesday, Jan. 29, 1986
01986 Collegian Inc.
Anita C. Huslin
Editor
William G. Landis Jr
Business Manager
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ion is determined by its Board of
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tors: Chris Raymond, Carol D. Rath,
Plymouth Rock:
Let's talk about a rock Plymouth Rock.
The one you learned about in the fourth
grade when you spent the three weeks
before Thankgiving learning about Pil
grims. In fouth grade, they told you that
Plymouth Rock was the boulder that the
Pilgrims first stepped out on when they
finally made it to the New World.
1 AtcA
As far as rocks go, it's a pretty famous
rock what with being a historical land
mark and all. But let's face facts here, a
granite boulder is a granite boulder even if
this one does have the year 1620 chiselled on
the side. It's just not that impressive, espe
cially if you're looking for something mean
ingful in Plymouth, Massachusetts.
Doug Frank; Arts Editor: Pat Grand-
Jean; Assistant Arts Editor: Victoria
Jaffe; Features Editor: Kris Sorchil
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Arens; Business Editor: Rich Dou
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Letters Policy: The Daily Collegian
encourages comments on news
coverage, editorial policy and Uni
versity affairs. Letters should be
typewritten, double-spaced, signed
by no more than two people and not
longer than 30 lines. Students' let
ters should include semester stand
ing, major and campus of the writer.
Letters from alumni should include
the major and year of graduation of
the writer. All writers should provide
their address and phone number for
verification of the letter.
The Collegian reserves the right to
edit letters for length and to reject
letters if they are libelous or do not
conform to standards of good taste.
Because of the number of letters
received, the Collegian cannot guar-
Realizing the importance of history without the facts being processed, memorized or recite.
The recommendations will ultimately be
acted upon by University President Bryce
Jordan. Garban sent them back to Tarman
who will resubmit them to the committee
with comments from the coaches.
The only indication on a final decision
came from Garban, who merely said he
hopes it will be in the next month. However,
some of the committee members said they
were unaware of a timetable for a decision.
Meanwhile, the coaches of these sports
are left wondering whether or not they
should start recruiting. Some of the teams
were told that they should start looking for
prospective recruits while others were told
to stop their recruiting efforts.
Since the recommendations to alter the
scholarship system became public last No
vember, no official decisions on them have
been made.
Two months later, the lack of resolutions
to these proposed changes have left the
future of these sports up in the air.
As a result, potential recruits for the
three teams who are interested in coming to
the University for the 1986-87 academic
year are wondering if they will be offered
scholarships.
These individuals and the teams need to
know what kind of money they will or will
not have in the future so they can get on
with preparing their teams for competition.
Deciding which teams receive schol
arships and which teams lose them is a
difficult one and not everyone can be
pleased. -
However, once a decision has been
reached, the administration must not allow
itself to get caught in the shuffle of papers
and red tape paper and tape that current
ly keeps some University sports programs
from moving.
It is time for the administration to ease
the minds of at least some coaches and
athletes on campus.
The people in Plymouth try very hard to
keep up the rock's reputation. The whole
town is very rock conscious piles of t
shirts, bumper stickers, little rock key
chains and pencil sharpeners are stocked in
every store and restaurant.
They're very sensitive about what you
think of the rock, and the first question out
of every waitress's mouth is "so, have you
seen the rock yet?"
They keep the rock in a especially con
structed pit right on the bay. It's sheltered
from the elements by an ornate, psuedo-
Greek classical building, complete with
granite pillars making it look a lot like a
temple. There's a railing around the pit to
keep the fawning tourists from touching it.
The whole set-up is very nice with a lot of
landscaping and strategically placed park
benches and gift shops. At any given time
during the right seasons of the year, the
whole area is crawling with tourists trying
to get close enough to the rock to get their
picture taken.
But there's just one problem. The rock
looks fake.
I mean it looks like you'd expect a granite
antee publication of all the letters it
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boulder to look, but it also looks like some
thing your mother would surround with
other rocks and shrubs and call a rock
garden. From looking at it, you can picture
your dog lifting a leg over it not exactly
the stuff of which national landmarks are
made.
The people in Plymouth must realize this.
The National Park people are always on
guard, ready to answer the inevitable smart
aleck who asks "how do you know that the
Pilgrims stepped on it? "Was anyone really
paying attention to the rocks when they got
off the Mayflower?"
They give "rock talks," a droll little
lecture delivered in a monotone voice by
some person who probably has several
advanced degrees in anthropology and his
tory. They have an annual Rock Day with a
parade, and they decorate the rock with a
garland of flowers.
The whole fiasco is a little pathetic and
you can sense the struggle for credibility
and dignity.
It strikes a lot of people who see the rock
that the only interesting thing about it is the
fact that it has been dropped twice, and both
reader opinion
Class act
Often on college campuses many positive aspects of
your University are over-looked or, worse yet, taken for
granted. On behalf of the University of Oklahoma March
ing Band, I would like to express to the entire Penn State
community how well the Penn State Blue Band rep
resented your University and state at the Orange Bowl.
In my seven Orange Bowl trips at Oklahoma, we have
met every extreme in fans and marching bands. Needless
to say all memories are not all positive.
We found the Penn State Marching Band staff and
membership to be extremely professional. Our students
totally enjoyed their relationships with members of the
band and only wish we had the opportunity to mix more
during our stay in Miami.
Penn State University has numerous things to be proud
of and the Blue Band is certainly one of them. The band's
performance and representation of your University was
exemplary you are a "CLASS ACT" and we salute you!
Gene Thrailkill, director
Pride of Oklahoma Marching Band
For life
Coverage of the abortion issue is difficult by its very
nature it is quite difficult to remain impartial on such a
controversial issue. However, after reading The Daily
Collegian 'scoverage of the issue, it isn't difficult to
deduce where some of the reporters stand.
For example, in the Wednesday issue of the Collegian,
Megan O'Matz wrote a article on the "debate still raging
after 13 years." In her article, O'Matz devoted four
paragraphs to the pro-life groups and 12 paragraphs to
two members of the pro-choice group. In short, O'Matz
gave the pro-choice people three times the amount of
space to vent their views as the pro-life members.
Obviously, evaluating an article's merit solely on emperi
cal data is foolish but this three-to-one ratio can hardly be
deemed "objective."
The next day O'Matz covered the March on Washing
ton, D.C. ; she was more impartial but still disappointing.
As a member of a pro-life group on campus, I attended the
it. A
A
times by the same people who make such a
big deal over it.
The irony is hard to resist. Here's a town
so proud of their rock that they wanted to
move it to a better location. Somebody
goofed and the old rock got dropped practi
cally right in the middle of Main Street.
Then some years later, they were moving
it to another place and they dropped it
again. This time it broke in half and had to
be cemented back together. Truthfully, the
rock is looking pretty shabby.
But the rock lives on, and thousands of
people file by every year to look at it. They
drag their kids (who are much more inter
ested in the hot dog stand, the gift shop and
the pigeons) over and make them look at the
rock. This is it, they're saying, this is a part
of history that I can grasp and understand.
The kids are a lot more realistic. Stand by
the rock long enough and you'll hear the
adults rhapsodizing about the Founding
Fathers, the Colonists and Freedom. Listen
to the kids and you hear that the rock is
broken, dirty, or just plain boring.
The kids know it's just a rock a granite
boulder with some numbers on the side
just like the Liberty Bell is just a mis-
The Daily Collegian
Wednesday, Jan. 29, 1986
march and was amazed at the diversity of poeple that
protested: Catholics, Jews, Protestants, Moslems, femi
nists, the young, the elderly and people from across the
country were there. Despite the extremely eclectic group,
Ms. O'Matz manages to quote a Catholic nun, four men
and a group of high school girls who "just wanted to get
out of school." So much for diversity.
Coverage of the local protest was equally dolorous.
Nancy Funk writes "45 men and 16 women protested a
pro-choice celebration banquet on campus." In the couple
of years I've been reading the paper I never saw an exact
count by SEX of any protest group.
Perhaps I am being hyper-sensitive, but it seems like
Ms. Funk is covertly displaying female-chauvidism. One
gets the impression from her statistics that the group was
primarily old-world men trying to oppress women. I don't
understand Funk's data because women outnumber men .
in our pro-life group.
There was another article that dealt with pro-life clinics
that was so asinine I won't even bother to comment on.
However, I would like to congratulate Valerie Bailey on
her column; in her column, Bailey raises an excellent
point many people want freedom of choice yet they
refuse to deal with the "choice" in moral fashion. I'd like
to further point out that the medical community has made
(and is making) quite a lot of blood-money from the over
20 million abortions that have resulted from the Supreme
Court decision.
I guess what bothers me the most about the media at
large is how they stereotype the pro-life group. Penn State
Students for Life are not reactionary abortion-clinic
bombers. We are a non-religious group (I am agnostic)
who believes that life is sacred before and after birth. W
believe that the retarded and the physicaly impaired have
just as much right to live as those that society deems
"normal." Throughout this year we have supported the
hungry (via the CROP Walk), runaway teens (throughout
Covenant House), and retarded children as well as the
unborn. If anyone is interested in what we are doing, we
are meetng this Wednesday, Jan. 29, in 319 Boucke
Building at 9:30 p.m.
Mark Kirby, secretary-Penn State Students for Life
shapen mold of metal with a crack in it
Maybe it has something to do with age,
but the older you get the more you think
history is something that you can hold onto.
It's the adults who trek off to Philadelphia
or Plymouth or some such place looking for
a rock or a bell that they can point at saying
"there, that's history."
But it's the kids who know that history is
way beyond anything that can be touched.
The kids don't need the past processed
into bits and pieces that they can memorize
and recite like so many facts on flashcards.
Even if their parents aren't, the kids are
willing to accept history without the bells
and rocks and things that the historical
societies and park commissions insist on
pinning to it.
Now, back to the rock. I have nothing
against it or the people who make money
from it. I went, I looked at it, I even bought
postcards. But I wasn't all that impressed
to every tourist her own attraction.
Karen Melchar is a senior majoring in
English and is a columnist for The Daily
Collegian. Her column appears every other
Wednesday.
C) 1986 Collegian Inc
opinions
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reader opinion
Not surprised
My hat is off to the 200 or so
students and townspeople who had
enough courage and mindfulness to
voice their opinion on Saturday con
cerning apartheid in South Africa. It
does not surprise me one bit that the
Board of Trustees still voted to main
tain the University's holdings.
Here we are, living in a society
where equal rights and brotherhood
are' preached from city hall to the
pulpit, and yet organizations such as
the Ku Klux Klan and the John Birch
Society still operate openly and carry
on their business, practically free
from reprisals.
I wonder how many people realized
that Monday was a national holiday?
It was just good old Martin Luther
King Day. You remember Martin
Luther King Jr., don't you? He's that
black guy who . . . oh, never mind, he
never did anything for this University
anyway so why should we observe a
holiday in his name, right? No, it
doesn't surprise me one bit.
My trousers are down to the 2,000 or
so students and townspeople who had
a high level of brain death to show
their support on Saturday to the Penn
State football team. Now there's a
cause we should all support.
What better way to rid the world of
oppression!? Well, for some people,
maybe that's their twisted way of
showing support for equal rights.
There are Blacks on the football
team, right? No, it doesn't surprise
me one bit.
Joseph A. Cipollina, graduate
chemistry
Jan. 21
The Daily Collegian Wednesday, Jan. 29, 1986-9
Immaturity
To the immature, foolish mob at the
bus stop in Parking Lot 80 on Satur
day night (Jan. 25):
We three girls in the front of the line
would like to voice our complaints
concerning your stupid behavior at
the bus stop. In all your impatience,
did you ever think that someone could
have been pushed beneath the wheels
of the bus and killed, or that someone
could have been suffocated or just
plain trampled from your pushing
and shoving?
You acted like grade school chil
dren, and for what? To go to a party?
Is a party so important to your social
lives that you'd kill to get there? One
of the three of us in the front was a
weekend visitor from Shippensburg
University, and she was thoroughly
appalled at the behavior that all of
you displayed not a favorable
impression of Penn State.
Another one of us (the author of this
letter) was the brunt of obscene re
marks, degrading comments and
physical abuse. We wanted to let you
know that we found your conduct
rash, stupid and unbecoming to the
students of Penn State. You ruined
our weekend very effectively.
Kira Billik, junior-English
Donna Lenzo, sophomore-math
Heidi Mehrholz, Shippensburg
Jan. 28
Who are you?
Who does David M. Silverman
think he is Nipsey Russell?
Henry C. Patschke, senior-film
Jan. 28