Image provided by: Clackamas Community College; Oregon City, OR
About The Clackamas print. (Oregon City, Oregon) 1989-2019 | View Entire Issue (Nov. 1, 1995)
W 1 The Clackamas Print 1 A 2 Colleges facing unsure future Wednesday, November Brendon Neal Opinion Editor Imagine going to almost any college site in Oregon and it be ing a satellite of Oregon State University or the University of Oregon. This is one of the pos sible changes that a governor’s work group and the Board of Higher Education’s Chancelor proposed. During the first week of Oc tober, Joe Cox the chancelor of the state Board of Higher Education, announced he was soliciting ideas for changes in Oregon’s higher education. The Oregonian noted that they could be the most fun damental changes in the system since the 1930s. The state system that cur rently stands originated between .1929 and 1932 and was necessi tated by the Great Depression. Cox and others feel that it is out dated and needs to be changed to come into sync with Oregon’s economy. Some of the possibilities im elude a two university model, single education board, public corporations, a Washington County campus, or revamp pub lic funding. In a system where Oregon State University and University of Oregon will be the only ma jor schools, with other current colleges becoming satellites we face the dangers inherent in any monopolies. Class prices would rise and curriculum would be in danger. While colleges can afford to lean towards certain programs or beliefs in the current system, in a dual college format we would have only two choices. If you don’t like either college’s way of doing things you are left with the choice of going out of state and paying higher prices elsewhere. There would be less college identity. A student going to a col lege in Portland would be going to the same college as the one down in Salem. Some believe that competition between schools is heatlhy. Free standing college corpo rations are dangerous. While it is a natural idea in a capitalist so ciety it would not work. While prices might stabilize if there were enough of the colleges/cor- porations it would bring the prob lem of over competition and spe cialization. Colleges would seek profits over quality in an attempt to keep from going bankrupt. If colleges were profitable states wouldn’t have to put mil lions of tax dollars into colleges every year. This might work if government subsidized and kept some control over the college cor porations. Without some regula tion the colleges would loose sight of their students’ needs. I would ask readers to con would also encourage more inter action between levels of educa tion. With a single board each level would be represented equally. However, the word com mittee gives me some misgivings. Multiple bureaucracies could eas ily be replaced by one full of com mittees that never actually got anywhere but instead talked about ideas for months on end. One idea for financial re vamping would involve convert ing half of the state funding for higher education into vouchers that resident students could use at any public or private post-second- ary school. While this would probably work for in state students what about out of staters? With out the vouchers they would al sider private colleges when read ing the above possibility. Look at their prices. Are these the rates you want to pay? The idea of a single educa tion board would combine several currently existing boards of edu cation into one. It would cover all state programs dealing with education. It would be headed by an appointed director and a non partisan board with committees specializing in K-12, community colleges and higher education as well as budgets. This idea could shrink some of the bureaucracy that plagues the current education system. It most assuredly have to pay even higher prices than they currently do. If we wish to prove Oregon’s higher education we need to en courage students from other states to come here. A more minor change would be merging the graduate pro grams at Portland State Univer sity with programs from the pri vate Oregon Graduate Institute into a single technical/research and teaching institute in Wash ington County. The only major problem I can see with this, is that OGI wouldn’t want to lose the freedoms often associated with private colleges. If they were will ing then this could give high-tech industries a boost in Oregon. Fees would probably be lower at the new college than at OGI but a little higher than at Portland State University. We all have time to consider these and other possibilities that are bound to come up in the fu ture. No new legislation is ex pected until the 1997 legislative session. However, hearings will start soon and the public, espe cially students and parents, should pay attention. Other concerns include the affect this will have on commu nity colleges. The words “com munity college” only come up once in more than a page of the Oregonian article from early Oc tober. If either combining or incor porating colleges occurs, this could have serious affects on the community college; combining especially since one of the com munity colleges’ specialties is di versity. With so many community colleges spread across the state students can live at home and go to college or choose from a vari ety of programs and systems. Also, incorporating would prob ably raise prices at all levels. The reason community col leges are especially needed is that they are far cheaper than four year colleges. Many students can’t af ford to go to a four year college or do not need a bachelor’s de gree. The information that is cur rently out is very vague. I would hope that Cox would submit to the public more detailed information in the near future. A possibility that is not mentioned would be a vote by the public or at least sev eral public hearings. If the gov ernment goes against public opin ion on this issue, it could be fac ing major problems. This affects most Oregonians and will affect more as getting college degrees become ever more important in the future. 4 V 4 A7 ▼ Humans have a lot in common Vicki Welch Copy Editor After reading Eric St. Anthony’s last opinion article about the teleconference, I was astounded at the way he trodded over humanity itself. First of all, Eric, we DO have a lot in common. We are humans. That one word says a lot about each and every one of us. After all, there are many words in the dictionary that are made from the root word hu man; humane, humanitarian, humanity, humankind, just to name a few. Humans belong to the homo-sapien family. We are flesh, blood and bone, with a little hair here and there. Humans have similar ex periences in their lives. We all come from the same begin nings. We are bom to parents who are supposed to love us and teach us. We live with them until we are mature enough to live on our own. We learn and learn, work and have kids, fall in love, but not nec essarily in that order. And then we die. And when we pass on our friends and family mourn our deaths. They bring over cas seroles and cakes to our fam ily. They reminisce about our lives. They remember. Each of us has an effect on the next person and they on us. We may not even be aware of that person, but that person changes us. For the better or for the worse, it matters not. We make mistakes, we learn, we go on. That’s what you expect of humans. We try hard, we fail or maybe we suc ceed. Who knows? And what matters most? We are human beings, we have rights and lives. We belong to the most advanced civilization on this small planet, as far as we know. We are humans. The Clackamas Print Staff Alternative lifestyle hits home Editor-in-Chief: Chad Patteson (Ext. 2576) Managing Editor: Amy K. Hanson (Ext. 2576) Feature Editor: Jon Roberts (Ext. 2578) Sports Editor: Jesse Sowa (Ext. 2578) Photography Editor: Josh Kehler (Ext. 2578) Copy Editor: Vicki Welch (Ext. 2578) Opinion Editor: Brendon Neal (Ext. 2576) Business Manager: Cori Kargel (Ext. 2578) Student learns to. deal with his mom’s sexuality ♦ ♦♦♦ Staff Writers/Photographers: Eric Eatherton, Dan Anderson, Megan Friedow, Lora Wahrgren, Linda Barr Batdorf, Andrew Beck, Pamela Sirianni, Nikki Fuller, Ryan Humphris, Dylan T. Hutter, Paul Ulmen, Lisa Marie Secretary: JoAnne Gale (Ext. 2309) Advisor : Linda Vogt (Ext. 2310) The Clackamas Print aims to report the news in an honest, unbiased, professional manner. The opinions expressed in The Clackamas Print do not necessarily reflect those of the student body, college administration, its faculty or The Clackamas Print's advertisers. Products and services advertised in The Clackamas Print are not necessarily endorsed by anyone associated with The Clackamas Print. The Clackamas Print is a weekly publication distributed every Wednesday except for finals week. The advertising rate is $4.50 per col umn inch. All signed letters to the editor will be considered for publication and must be submitted by 1 p.m. the Friday prior to the next issue. Clackamas Community College, 19600 S. Molalla Avenue, Oregon City, Oregon, 97045; Barlow 104; (503) 657-6958, ext. 2309. E-mail: cccprint@clackamas.cc.or.us Ryan Humphris Staff Writer I was eleven years old when my parents were divorced. Di vorce is hard on a kids because they don’t know why it’s happen ing, or what they did to make their parents hate each other enough to separate. In my case, it wasn’t what I did- or what my brothers and sis ters did- but it was the fact that my mother had decided that she was not heterosexual, she did not like men anymore and she was homosexual. This was a shock ing fact to be heard by an eleven year old, not even knowing what it meant to be homosexual. My mother tried to explain it to me, but in the mid 80’s no body in elementary school even thought about what it would be like to kiss or have sex with an other person of the opposite sex. We as guys hated the girls, and the girls hated us guys. I left my mother’s side in dis gust and hatred, not wishing to see or speak with her ever again. I was totally shocked by the fact that my own mother was leaving my father for another woman. Eeeeew! After about two years had passed I decided after growing a little bit older and learning more about gays and lesbians I called her to say that I was sorry and that I loved her. During the next few months we talked and learned to understand where each of us were coming from, growing closer to gether the more we talked with each other. After another year had passed, she moved back to Utah and I moved in with her, after fi nally settling our differences about our opinions on the subject of being homosexual. Through this experience I have learned that no matter who my mother sleeps with or who she kisses in public or whatever lifestyle she has, she will always be my mom and I will love her forever. After learning more about the homosexual lifestyle as a whole, being drawn in so close dealing with my mom, I have realized that whether a person is gay or straight makes no difference to me. People should not be hated or ridi culed for that fact. Everyone is human and we all live our own lives, make our own choices and suffer the consequences thereof, good or bad. Every person in this world is different in their own way. We need not judge a person for being different; rather we should commend them for stand ing up for their beliefs.
