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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (April 10, 1970)
Comment Meetings of the general faculty are sometimes amusing, sometimes boring, sometimes ludicrous—but almost never significant. Wednesday’s faculty meeting was par for the course. The meeting could have been the most significant faculty session in years. The faculty could have voted to rescind ROTC contracts, which, in effect, would remove the military training pro gram from campus. But after what can only be described as a filibuster by pro-ROTC forces in the faculty, and an apparent cop-out by anti ROTC faculty, the vote never came. The only really significant occurance was that students were able to speak on the floor more than the token five minutes gen erally allotted them. The vote on ROTC contracts was sup posed to have come in December, and in order to understand the intricacies of faculty logic, we must follow the motion’s history. At the December meeting, the vote was postponed until the report by the student-faculty committee to study ROTC curriculum was completed. Evi dently, the faculty’s reasoning was that it must first decide whether or not the ROTC curriculum was academically sound before it could decide to kick the program off campus. So last week, the committee’s report was issued, and a motion from the report was brought to the floor of the faculty for this meeting. The motion was to set up a standing ROTC advisory com mittee. But since the report on ROTC cur riculum had been issued, the first motion —to remove the ROTC contracts—could Editorial We can still defeat the $75 deposit In an action approved by the University Registrar, ap proved by President Clark, approved by the State Board of Higher Education—approved by many people, in fact, who will not have to pay it—the University is now requiring a $75 deposit to be sent with the Intent To Enroll card. The people who do NOT approve are an increasing portion of the students who will be affected by the requirement. Their reasons for disapproving and disliking the deposit have a strong basis: • An outlay of $75 is an impossibility for many students weeks or months before actual enrollment. • The ASUO was not consulted about the finalization of the proposal and generally does not approve of the deposit. • The rationale for the deposit is ridiculous: that it is ‘‘honest money,” giving the University a better idea of po tential enrollment. Registrar Donald Rhoades and Associate Dean of Students Larry Large, whose brain child this is, propose that the stu dents cough up $75 at the very time most of them are trying to raise this kind of money. If it has not occurred to these two gentlemen, lack of cash is the reason for things like summer jobs, and part time work. The students that are hurting for cash have enough problems already. A big part of the student body falls into this category. The University claims it needs an accurate idea of how many students will be enrolling in the fall. Fair enough, but the difference between the number who file intent to enroll notices and those who actually show up is two or three! How much closer can you get? Students and student leaders should work towards convinc ing President Clark that this proposal is both unnecessary and harmful to student interests. The matter of a deposit fee for out-of-state students is out of President Clark’s hands. The matter of a deposit fee for IN-STATE students is very much in his hands: he has the power to do about this what ever he sees fit, including lowering the amount or doing away with it altogether. Recently, a petition was circulated “committing” stu dents to a "boycott" of the deposit fee. Students should care fully consider their actions before signing such a petition. It would be easy for the University to deny enrollment to those students who did not come up with $75, in the event President Clark does nothing about it The answer lies in doing something about this situation REFORE next fall, relying heavily on student leaders and supporting them Committment to a course of action which could jeopardize an individual education would seem inadvisable. The $75 deposit is a stab in the back for students who have to hustle for books and tuition—and that's most of us. also be discussed at this meeting. The author of this motion, Andrew Thompson of the University Counseling Center, ar gued that if his motion passed, then the proposal to set up an advisory committee would be unnecessary. So he moved that the motion coming out of the ROTC cur riculum committee be postponed until the motion on ROTC contracts was considered. That motion passed, and the faculty was in their votes (which implies that debate on the issue is meaningless) also failed. A third try to postpone discussion (until the Faculty Senate had reviewed the mat ter) lost as well. The conservatives had exhausted all parliamentary machinery in which to block a vote at this meeting. But these motions, interspersed with amendments, appeals to the chair and other time-consuming rigamarole, had The faculty flounders again Abandon all hope ye who enter a faculty meeting back at the same point they had been last December. If this has seemed confusing, it is. It seemed, at this point, the faculty members were ready to face the issue of whether ROTC should remain on campus. They had voted by a substantial margin to allow students to speak on the issue, and listened to them for a half hour. They subsequently listened another half hour to Thompson’s criticism of ROTC. Then the conservatives (i.e., those faculty mem bers wishing to “conserve” ROTC on this campus) began the filibuster. A motion to postpone consideration of the Thomp son motion until a report from another committee to study ROTC contracts completed failed. A motion for all fac ulty not attending the meeting to mail eaten up two hours and most faculty were ready to go home. A motion to end debate finally came up, and this is where the liberals got cold feet. The vote on ROTC contracts was sure to be close, but it seemed that the motion had a chance of passing. Some liberals, possibly thinking more debate was needed, voted to keep it going. Some conservatives voted to close off debate . . . There was even division in the ROTC faculty camp, with most, but not all ROTC instructors voting to extend de bate. The motion to close off debate and vote on the question lost, 84-81. No more than a minute later, it was moved that the faculty adjourn until 3:30 p.m. next Wednesday, and that carried to end the meeting. and Tribune Syndicate Letters Spring sing This year Spring Sing is open to any University group, whereas only living organizations could participate in the past. The only real qualification is that the size of each entry must be between 20 and 50. The opportunities this presents are innumerable. For example groups of off-campus students, faculty members, dorm counsel ors. and various student unions could all participate. Such groups need only give me a call at 345 9677 to register. ' •' Spring * Sing’ will take • place Students and faculty who have been pushing for the removal of ROTC from this campus may never again get the chance they passed up Wednesday. When the faculty meeting reconvenes next Wednesday, the turnout will be much higher than the 170 who debated the issue at the last meeting. It’s unlikely that stu dents will be given the same chance to express their views on the issues as they had this last time. And it’s probable that faculty debate will not continue as long. Moreover, academic society conferences in the social sciences will be going on next week, which may subtract some key faculty in these disciplines, who general ly compose a large bulk of the anti-ROTC forces. Two years ago the faculty passed a resolution condemning the Vietnam War. But besides this symbolic protest, they have done nothing specific to remove the University from involvement in the war. Yet by now, the connection between the war and the ROTC program must seem obvious to them. One explanation of this lack of commitment may be that most of the grants for research the faculty re ceive come from the government. Thus, they may feel that the removal of ROTC would endanger the continuance of these grants. If this is true, then it’s time for the faculty to take such a risk, and for once make a decision simply on the principle of the situation. That means, ROTC must go. by gil johnson “• • • Because our bombing runs over North and South Vietnam were so successful in containing Communist agression ...” * Saturday night, May 9, during Moms’ and Dads’ Weekend, sincerely hope that many differ ent groups will take advantage of this change and participate. Susan Marshall Junior, Music * * * Spence and .Marlene 1 am very pleased to have read of the candidacy of Spence A1 pert and his running mate Mar lene Wylde. From my contact in the ASUO Senate with Spence and Marlene I have seen that they both pos sess two qualities that are ol prime importance to presidential . candidates—an ability to discern the important elements in any issue and to act upon these is sues—and any unusual ability to work and co-operate with others in student business. They are genuinely concerned with bettering the status of stu dents in academic areas as well as non-academic—on campus as w'ell as off. Spence and Marlene to me are the best of the candidates. I be lieve that they would make fine executives. Phil Knudsen r - . ASUO Senator