EDITORIAL
New loan program a
boon to students
Students at this University • and at 104 others - who
may have been feeling victimized by the government
over the past few years, finally have something to be
happy about.
President Clinton’s new Federal Direct Student Loan
Program, which will now service the University, is like
ly to be both a boon to students as well as a catalyst for
revitalizing the President’s faltering support among col
lege students.
Under the new loan program, students will not have
to request loans from private lenders as they have in the
past. Instead, all the money will come from the Depart
ment of Education and will be distributed to the stu
dents by the business officos of the colleges they attend.
In addition to saving the government an estimated
$4.3 billion in the next five years, tho now plan offers a
number of benefits to students:
It will save students money, because the government’s
new loan origination rate (a percentage of the total
loaned) is only four percent, instead of the current 6.5
percent. This con equal hundreds of dollars in some
cases.
It will save students time, because the private lender
middleman will be eliminated, shortening the duration
of the loan process from months to just weeks.
It will save students an awful lot of extra effort,
because there’s only one form to fill out, and it gets
dropped off at one place and one place only. Before, the
student was responsible for toting the loan forms (once
they were returned from the government's processing
center in Iowa) to a bank, and if the loan was approved
by that bank, the student would have to wait for the
bank to send him or her a loan check in the mail.
Finally, and thankfully, the new process will save stu
dents anxiety. When was the last time students got to
worry less about financial matters, instead of more?
Another advantage, while not a savings per se. is per
haps the most important feature of the new plan: stu
dents' repayment schedules will be based upon their
income in post-college employment, effectively granti
ng students more freedom in choosing a job after college.
Currently, students are under heavy pressure to find a
job immediately after graduation in order to pay off their
loans. This could theoretically force a graduate to pass
over a good but low-paying job, which may have been
within the student’s field of expertise, in favor of a high
er-paying but otherwise inappropriate position.
Horror stories of degree-holding graduates working
at supermarkets or waiting tables - all because they have
to pay off their student loans • are too numerous to
count.
Obviously, graduates should have to pay pff the loans
eventually, but it seems only natural that the pace at
which they make those repayments should be deter
mined by their income, and that they should be allowed
to choose a job that lets them put all those years of edu
cation to good use.
After all. what have they been paying for?
Oregon Daily
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LETTERS
Gas guzzling
I^isl week OSPIRG doomsday
ers were out preaching the evils
of the automobile. I for one am
not about to give up, or even
reduce my usage of. the gas-guz
zling automobile with its V-H
engine. Furthermore, I resent my
implication that 1 should, partic
ularly when it comes to a bunch
of hippie kids
In 1920, the Interior Depart
ment reported to Congress that
the current level of oil produc
tion. about one million barrels
per year, was unsustainable. In
the past 70 years, the cries of
unsustainable energy have never
ceased and never ceased to be
wrong,
If you find the air in Oregon
too polluted for you. get into
your camper-van and go some
where else; at least get that thing
fixed so it doesn't make that
blue smoke.
David Cola
General Science
Protection
Why shouldn't homosexuals
have civil right protections? By
now. most Oregonians have
heard lots of reasons. Homosex
uality is allegedly a choice, a
behavior, not genetic race or
gender. Homosexuality is wrong
according to our traditions, and
it would violate the rights of our
traditional religious people if
they were forced to hire homo
sexuals. Homosexuals don't
need protections because their
average income is high, and
such protection would be wrong
because it would be an endorse
ment of their values and would
give them special minority sta
tus.
These arguments are clever,
and the Oregon Citizens
Alliance has certainly been
doing its homework. But there's
something more than something
a little wrong with them. To see
what, consider that the same
arguments apply on the case of
unpopular religions. Religions
are actually chosen, they involve
behavior, and are certainly not
genetic. Those of dominant reli
gions typically see those of oth
er religions as "wrong'' or oven
evil, and sometimes claim a
right to fire such evildoers.
Members of unpopular religions
sometimes have a high average
incomes, etc.
The fact is. every one of the
CXiA's points listed here is an
argument for intolerance in gen
eral. The CX’A just doesn't rec
ognize that a person's relation
ship with Cod and spirituality,
and a person's sexual orienta
tion and family life, are all high
ly personal and not a legitimate
basis for firing or evicting them.
Prohibiting such malicious dis
crimination is not an endorse
ment of anyone or granting of
minority status, but just a simple
matter of insuring a civil society
and personal freedom.
Ron Unger
Eugene
March
Hiring a study to verify the
administration's decisions to
demolish Amazon is an insult to
all parties involved just as any
"task fon:e" or "user group” cre
ated by the University to mere
ly rubber stamp what the Uni
versity has already dec ided.
A coalition of community
groups and individuals continue
to wait for the University to
accept our offers of professional,
technical, economic and physi
cal aid in achieving what we
believe should be mutually ben
eficial goals of monitoring safe
and affordable housing through
the restoration of Amazon and
the recognition of its value as an
autonomous community.
On Friday, we urge the Uni
versity community to join the
Short March for Justice as part of
the National Homeless Aware
ness Week. This year the funeral
will have a funeral theme as
members of the community.
OSPIRG and the Homeless
Action Coalition walk behind a
casket symbolizing the potential
death of affordable housing in
Eugene.
The march, which will be
assembling about 9:15 a m. in
the EMU Courtyard, is intended
to protest the University's plans
to demolish Amazon low-cost
housing and the resulting dis
placement in the Eugene-Spring
field area. At 9:30 a.m.. the short
march will proceed to Johnson
Hall and back to the EMU,
where the demonstration will
move to the EMU Gumwood
Room at 10 a.m. There advocates
for saving Amazon as low-cost
housing will address the state
Board of Higher Education
regarding the need for a morato
rium on the current plan for
Amazon while other options are
explained more thoroughly and
without the bias toward demo
lition.
David Zupan
Eugene Citizens tor
Low-Cost Housing
KWVA VS. MTV
In response to Phillip Abra
ham's letter from (ODE. Nov. 16),
I’d like to say that to maybe clear
up any confusion, our dial set is
88 1 FM. KWVA's request line is
346-0645. and if there’s some
thing he'd love to hear, he may
simply request it.
Although a hulk of our pro
gramming may he unfamiliar to
Mr Abraham, judging from the
requests we get on a regular
basis, this doesn’t appear to be
the case with most of our cur
rent listening audience.
Bands like "Primus." "Smash
ing Pumpkins" and "Tool" seem
to be what people call "college
radio” were exactly that in the
1986. A quick stroll through the
past few months of the weekly
top 20s we publish in the Col
lege Music Journal would seem
to indicate that we played ouite
a bit of the music Mr. Abraham
says he never hears on our sta
tion even though none of these
bands have put a decent album
out in the past three years.
Finally, l‘d like to add one
more point. If "college radio”
was about giving the listeners
music from bands that have
been million-plus sellers for
more than five years each, while
trying to pass it off as "alterna
tive," we wouldn't be KWVA,
we’d be MTV'.
Norman
KWVA DJ