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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (Feb. 11, 1975)
Bra burners-no Women’s studies now a reality as all opposition is overcome By WARREN MORGAN Of the Emerald “The Stale Board was afraid it was a bunch of SEARCH courses on bra burning.” That was one of our obstacles, continued Miriam Johnson, a framed segment of Doonesbury’s Ms Caucus above her desk. The problem was get ting academic respectibility, said the Sociology Instructor and member of the Women’s Studies Council. After several years of discus sions, ad hoc committees, pro posals and counter proposals, Women s Studies is a reality. The State Board of Higher Education approved the program this past summer as a certified course of study. Bra Burning 101 is not offered but courses like The Woman Wri ter, Sociology of Women, Intro duction to Women and Literature, Psychology of Sex Differences and Introduction to Women s Studies are some that are offered. A student taking 21 hours of clas ses which have been approved by the Women’s Studies Council can earn a Certificate in Women's Studies. Fifteen of these hours must be in course work and six may, but need not, be in Research and Directed Reading. The program is interdisciplinary in nature. Women’s Studies offers a course, the Division of Continu ing Education sponsors a few W.S. 199 courses and various de partments offer courses in their area which relate to Women's Studies. Introduction to Women’s Studies (W.S. 101) is the one re quired course in the program. Olga Broumas, the instructor, said responses to the class has been very good, even overwhelming. Last year there were about 80 to 100 students enrolled each term, but this year she has limited the size to 60. As a result there is now a waiting list of about 60 for the class. Broumas limited the size because she felt 100 students were too many for one person to work with. Last year all Broumas did was teach one class. This year, she says, she spends an additional equal amount of time with coordi nation duties. She is, however, still paid the same. “We need at least a .5 Full Time Equivalent (FTE) Instructor,” she said. "The work I’m doing is at least that.” This situation is a reflection of the central problem of Women’s Studies—money. The current operating budget is about $3,400, down from the approximate $30,000 request sent to the fa cutty Senate. It’s enough to pay one instructor at .22 FTE, a stu dent cterk on work study and a little left over for office supplies. The original office assigned to the program was inadequate and on the fringes of campus, so the lib rary school donated a temporarily vacant office in PLC. Various other departments have sub sidized the program with either supplies, money or time according to Patricia Pond, library school Instructor and chairer of the Women s Studies Council. One of the things lost when the budget was reduced was a direc tor for the program. Pond said that if she had to set a priority now, highest would be a coordinator. A disadvantage with the present council arrangement is the lack of a central place or person for advis ing students. A coordinator, or at least a half-time instructor half-time coordinator would pro vide the needed advising, said Pond. Marilyn Farwell, English in structor and member of the Women's Studies Council, ag rees. "We need someone who can give more time to coordina tion. It needs more attention than any full-time faculty can give it,” she said. So far, enthusiasm for Women’s Studies has made the volunteer effort work. The volunteer effort, however, can only go so far. People trying to get tenure might feel they can’t spend a great deal of time on vol unteer work for a program, said Johnson. This affects a number of instructors now teaching courses in the Women's Studies area. Another potential problem area is course and faculty stability. Johnson said she knew of at least three instructors now teaching Women’s Studies courses who were hired as visiting instructors on one year appointments. The departments would like to keep ( Continued on Page 3) Minority leader talks at ‘Monolith’ Tonight's session of Un derstanding the University Monolith, CSPA 407 will feature Roger Martin, Oregon House Monority Leader and president of the University Alumni Associa tion. Martin will make a major policy statement on financing higher education. The room will be different for this session; Dad’s Room, EMU at 7 p.m. All interested University mem bers are invited to come. It isn’t us! A person identifying him self as an employe of a local adult bookstore is re portedly making a tele phone survey on peoples sexual activities. The caller says the survey is for the Oregon Daily Emerald. The Emerald is conduct ing no such survey nor is it working with any adult bookstore. The Emerald is interested in hearing from people who have been contacted by this individual. One Shot today will keep flu away Because the flu has reached epidemic levels the University Student Health Center will be giving flu shots today and tomorrow from 8 a.m. to noon and from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Thursday. Students are charged $1 for the shot, which can be deducted from the break age fee, and faculty and staff are charged $2. At this time the health center is uncertain how many weeks the shots will be offered. Minnesota teachers file collective bargaining suit (CPS) — Minneapolis, MN. Leon Knight teaches English at North Hennepin Community Col lege near the Twin Cities of Min nesota, but he sounds more like a political scientist when he talks about world history as a story of powerful groups taking advantage of the powerless. In Knight s case, the powerless group is 20 Minnesota community college teachers who are suing the Minnesota Faculty Associa tion, which represents them in labor-management get-togethers; the Community College Board, which runs community colleges in Minnesota. The charge is violating the con stitutional rights of the teachers. The suit is directed at a Min nesota law—20 other states, in cluding Oregon, have similar laws—which requires that public employes be represented in bar gaining sessions by a single rep resentative organization. It is the first such suit to be filed since faculties began to unionize. If the Minnesota professors win their suit, collective bargaining in higher education would be thrown wide open to non-union bargain ers. This could significantly in crease the amount of input stu dents could have in negotiations, since up to now the strictly enforced industry model has no place for students, except by the whim of one of the negotiators. Although the suit wouldn’t grant students any rights per se, it could increase the number of faculty bargaining groups that might be more receptive to student input than the monolithic unions. The plaintiff teachers, from three Minnesota community col leges, are claiming in federal de strict court that the law abridges their First Amendment right to freedom of association. In another claim, the teachers charge violation of the due pro cess procedure in determining how much nonmembers of the fa culty union should pay for benefits the union gains for all teachers. This "fair share” percentage is 97 per cent cf union membership fees for the present academic year—which amounts to about $100 per teacher. The teachers feel that a deci sion in the case will have wide im plications, partly because it will af fect faculties at 311 colleges in 20 states under similar laws, but also because it will touch every labor-management situation which is presently under the exclusive-bargaining agent setup. The US Supreme Court refused to review the only similar case which went that far in 1935, Knight said. The present suit would never have made it to court if the teachers were acting on thejr own, he added. The plaintiffs are receiv ing funding help from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Fund, based in Washington, DC.