I TUESDAY, JULY 20, 2010
THE DAILY
Collegian
Elizabeth Murphy
Editor in Chief
Kelsey Thompson
Business Manager
About the Collegian: The
Daily Collegian and The
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lished by Collegian Inc., an
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rial opinion is determined by
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the editor holding final
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Inc. or The Pennsylvania
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of Opinion.
Members are:
Kevin Cirilli, Jenna Ekdahl,
Bill Landis, Elizabeth Mur
phy, Laura Nichols, Edgar
Ramirez, Andrew Robinson,
Heather Schmelzlen, Jared
Shanker, Katie Sullivan, Alex
Weisler, Steph Witt and
Chris Zook.
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Roads must be tolls' beneficiary
Starting Jan. 2, travelers
on the Pennsylvania Turn
pike, including Penn State
students and their family
members, will have to pay
more money to use the
road.
The turnpike commis
sion voted last week to
increase rates by 10 per
cent for cash customers
and 3 percent for those
using E-ZPass.
Though the turnpike
has raised fares just
seven times in the last 70
years, the commission has
done so three times in
just the last 18 months.
The raises seem unavoid
able, but the state, which
will make an estimated
$35 million more every
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Fed, state tuition tug of war irritating
By Shannon Simcox
MUCH like other Penn
State students, I
opened up my tuition
bill last week It
was as if there
needed to be a
drum roll lead
ing up to its
release
Between the
Penn State
Board of
Trustees decid
ing how much
tuition to raise
tuition and the state govern
ment deciding to pass a budget
without too much of a fuss, I for
one was holding my breath.
We all expected the rise in
tuition. Penn State President
Graham Spanier has been say
ing we can look forward to these
raises, so that was no surprise.
The surprise for me came with
an e-mail I received along with
my tuition bill.
Being one of the fortunate
Penn State students who
receive financial aid, including a
Pennsylvania state grant, it was
to my great surprise to see in
my inbox an e-mail regarding
this grant right alongside my
tuition bill. The e-mail informed
me of the following: "The 2010-11
budget for the Commonwealth
of Pennsylvania was signed into
law by Governor Rendell on July
6, 2010. This budget includes
MY OPINION
year from the increase,
should not be the sole
beneficiary.
About two-thirds of all
vehicles traveling on the
turnpike already use E
ZPass, according to Turn
pike Commission
spokesman Carl DeFebo,
but this increase in fares
is going to force those
who don't use the technol
ogy to think twice about
doing so.
As a result, more driv
ers could begin switching
to E-ZPass, lessening the
turnpike's need to hire
people to work in toll
booths. With the money
saved from cutting jobs,
the state should make the
needed improvements to
Tape
"While the federal government is increasing
the direct loan program, the state is decreas
ing state grants. This does not seem like a
plan that meshes together."
funding for the Pennsylvania
State Grant Program. Based on
the amount of these funds,
it was necessary to revise your
Pennsylvania State Grant award
for the 2010-11 academic year"
Not exactly the words of
encouragement you need in
order to open the tuition bill. By
revise they mean lower.
All I could think about when I
see the state grant slowly
declining and the Pell grants
slowly rising is the complete tug
of war between the state and
federal governments when it
comes to encouraging higher
education.
While the federal government
is increasing the direct loan pro
gram, keeping students on their
parents' insurance policies
longer and increasing Pell grant
funding, the state government is
decreasing the state grants and
decreasing funds to Penn State.
This does not seem like a plan
that meshes together but
instead seems like two entities
that are completely repelling
each other
Why, state legislators, is high
er education not on your agen
da? I understand putting a
state roads and bridges.
Pennsylvania highways,
specifically the turnpike
and Interstate 80 the
two most-traveled high-
ways to get to Penn State
are notoriously bad.
Both are littered with pot
holes and are showing sig
nificant signs of wear.
With the turnpike now
providing funding to the
Pennsylvania Department
of Transportation, con
struction jobs should be
more frequent and, more
importantly, quicker. With
this increase in fares, the
commission should have
the meats to improve the
roads for the people pay
ing to drive on them and
in a timely fashion.
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LET'S HOPE
IT WORKS...
budget together is obviously a
difficult task (or why else would
it take so long?), but the pursuit
of higher education shouldn't be
a financial burden.
With such a large unemploy
ment rate and the abundance of
economic problems, people
should be encouraged to go to
school, not discouraged by ris
ing prices and state budgets.
'lb the state legislators, Board
of Trustees and even federal
representatives: Please remem
ber what it was like back when
you were opening your tuition
bills as you are making these
tough decisions today. It is, in
fact, your future leaders who
you are making these decisions
for.
Students, don't lose hope.
Eventually, as the gray hairs
have taken over our heads and
the pitter-patter of little feet
have turned to thumps, those
student loans will be paid off.
Eventually
Shannon Slmcox is a senior majoring
in journalism and political science and
is the Collegian's Tuesday columnist.
Her e-mail address is
scsso96@psu.edu.
THE DAILY COLLEGIAN
Despite no 'lO White House,
PSU crowds will still be loud
I agree that looking at our football sched
ule for this year, it is a little on the dull side.
Most of our big games this year are on the
road (Alabama, lowa, and Ohio State),
which will be a big test for our team, but I
still have faith in our fans. The White
House is a huge tradition for our fans and
school, and I agree that it should be kept
for only our big games. but you never know
what will happen in college football. We
could run the table and the Oct. 30 game
against Michigan could be bigger then we
think, or we could have another season like
last year. You just never know. Whether we
have a "White House" scheduled, our fans
will bleed blue and white and we will rock
Beaver Stadium. There will be tons of
white, and our students will definitely bring
the "White Out," and, if needed, maybe the
rest of the stadium will follow
Wanted: Web Intern
The Collegian is seeldng a web intern for
the fall semester to join its award-winning
web team. This position offers a merit
based $l,OOO scholarship per semester.
We are diving into several new web ini
tiatives this fall including a brand new
website, and are looking for applicants
with a working knowledge of HTML, CSS
and proficiency in at least one of the fol
lowing: Javascript, Flash, PHP, Perl,
ASPnet, or C#. We are also looking into
mobile applications, as well, so a knowl
edge of or interest in learning about
mobile development is encouraged hut not
required.
You will be working with the Web Editor,
who also has a knowledge of these tech
nologies. This position requires a flexible
but steady time commitment. Your respon
sibilities will vary based on your skills, but
could include designing pages and/or
interactive pieces for our site, writing
scripts to parse and reformat old stories or
communicate with public APIs (Twitter,
Tumblr, etc), or designing back-end man
agement systems, among other things.
An interest in journalism and being a
part of an independent student newspaper
is highly encouraged, as well.
To apply, send a resume and cover letter
to Editor in Chief Elizabeth Murphy at
editorinchief@psucollegian.com.
Editor in Chief
I put out a call to any and all interest
ed editorial cartoonists just two weeks
ago. We seem to have struck gold with
our first response: Alex Donahue. Let
me give you some back-story: The
Collegian has never had much luck
recruiting and maintaining quality car
toonists. In previous years. we've gotten
cartoonist applications with artwork that
looks like I drew it (trust me, you can't
run that stuff in a newspaper) and we've
gotten cartoonists that can draw every
twist and turn of the Eiffel Tower but
don't know Sarah Palin froth Sarah
McLachlan. And some years we've got
ten squat absolutely no applications.
So you can see why Alex is such celebri
ty to us in the newsroom. The guy can
draw the pants off any person in the
room, and not only does he know how to
spell Sarah Paliffs name, he !mows that
she used to be Alaska's Governor!
On Sunday, Editor in Chief Elizabeth
Murphy sat down with reporter
Kathleen Loughran, who wrote the July
11 Venues doubletruck story about the
history of Arts Fest, "From paintings to
parties, Arts Fest evolves over 44-year
history" It's the second edition of
Murphy's regular podcast series that
gives readers the story behind the story
with the reporter, photographers and
editors who helped put the story togeth
er.
Read more from the Editor-in-Chief blog and
the rest of The Daily Collegian's blogs at psucol
legian.com/blogs.
Footblog
When the coaching staff asked Quinn
Barham to switch from guard to left
tackle after the Capital One Bowl, he
laughed at first. "I thought it was a joke,"
Barham said, "but they said they wanted
me to do it, so I'm ready for it." Barham
played tackle in high school, so the posi
tion switch isn't new ground for the red
shirt junior. He said his short torso and
long arms and legs make the tackle posi
tion the right fit for him. To get back the
feel for the tackle position, Barham has
been sprinting and performing ladder
drills. He'll need to be quick at tackle to
keep up with the Big Ten's defensive
ends, like lowa's Adrian Clayborn, whose
picture is set as the background on
Barham's phone for motivational rea
sons. Barham said he has been practic
ing to play left tackle. If Johnnie
Troutman beats out DeOn'tae Pannell
for the left guard spot, Pannell may chal
lenge Barham for the starting left tackle
position. But as of now, the redshirt jun
ior seems entrenched at the left end.
Barham doesn't believe there is much
difference between left and right tackle
besides protecting the quarterback's
blind side.
Read more from the football blog Footbiog and
the rest of The Daily Collegian's blogs at psucol
leglan.com/blogs.
Mick Wancheck
Class of 2009