Debates over UW-Madison's holistic admissions policy often boil down to one issue: Are efforts to increase diversity a means to some altruistic end—such as offsetting socioeconomic disadvantages—or a desirable end in themselves by exposing students to as many ideas and cultures as possible?
Recently, Republican gubernatorial candidate Scott Walker has expressed an interest in having former vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin endorse him. As a viable candidate with a record of solid results in fiscal policy (the area Wisconsin needs the most help with by far) in particular, this is a major step in the wrong direction for him.
The United Nations Development Program estimated it would cost $20 to $30 billion to provide clean water and sanitation universally to the entire world. Contrast that with this number: On average, Americans spend $450 billion every year on Christmas. With 5,000 children dying every day because of water-related diseases, spending $450 billion on Christmas almost seems like a crime.
Diversity issues extend beyond race and nationality. I would argue we are a product of our experiences, and though skin color and nationality play a significant role in influencing our experiences, encouraging a diversity of experiences on campus cannot be measured by admittance data alone. UW-Madison cannot hope to achieve true diversity simply through programs aimed at aiding minority students. A truly diverse campus would embrace students from all walks of life, whose experiences are as vast as they are different and who are united by a common goal: to educate and better themselves.
The Green Room is a new series from The Daily Cardinal dedicated to focusing on issues relating to the environment and energy. For its inagural article we have a contribution from the Wisconsin Students Public Interest Research Group (WISPIRG), one of UW-Madison's foremost organizations in the field of environmental advocay. If you are interested in writing for The Green Room, contact us at opinion@dailycardinal.com.
Today's Student Organization Neighborhood guest editorial comes courtesy of Action in Sudan. The Student Organization Neighborhood is a biweekly column dedicated to giving a voice to student groups across campus.
If the economic recession of the past year has taught anything to policy makers, it is that any recovery is likely to be slow and halting. One might think the top priority of local and state officials would be job creation in such an anemic environment, with families going hungry statewide because one or both parents are out of work.
The word ""diversity"" often conjures up thoughts of ethnicity, particularly on a college campus buzzing with conversation sparked by an article this paper published.
We are now entering the home stretch in the cycle of rental panic within the student population. The rumors are just going to keep getting more urgent and less informative until winter break, and after that, the roar about renting will quiet to a whisper. Right now is the perfect time for landlords and rental companies to hype up that they are running out of choice units in an attempt to get inexperienced students to go out and take those rentals at whatever cost. Every year, it seems most students have secured their living situations and all the good properties are gone by Thanksgiving break, which is true if your choice of living space happens to be in a property belonging to a company like Tallard or Steve Brown.
Racist. There has been a bit of a stir on the Daily Cardinal opinion page recently regarding that word, as well as its relation to a column written by Andrew Carpenter. I won't address the merits of Carpenter's argument, I'm sure he can explain himself a lot better than I can. But there was one aspect of the criticism his article received that continued an all-too-common trend I've seen on campus. It seemed that the natural, gut response from most readers was to call Carpenter a racist.
Recently, the UW Labor Licensing Policy Committee voted 7-2 to suggest Chancellor Biddy Martin take written action against Nike for their violation of UW labor codes. Disregard for labor policies from big corporations is nothing new, particularly with apparel contracts here at UW. In the past, Martin and the LLPC have made their attitudes toward this disregard for human rights known, and it has led to the termination of several UW apparel contracts. This incident with Nike is no exception to previous policies and decisions, and the administration needs to act accordingly. Rather than just sending a scathing letter to Nike, we must take the steps necessary to terminate our contracts with the company.
Everybody knows diversity matters. For college students, an important way for us to explore the idea is through various student groups on campus. That's probably why UW-Madison now hosts a dazzling number of student organizations. While ""diversity by numbers"" is without doubt a convenient criterion to measure our progress, student participation should be the ultimate standard to gauge the quality of UW's diversity. However, the current lack of communication between student organizations has become a major obstacle deterring students from fully appreciating campus diversity.
On Nov. 17, 2009, The Daily Cardinal published the opinion column ""Race deserves no place in university admissions."" Over the past several days we have witnessed a significant reaction to the article by students on campus, and it is obvious the article sparked a dialogue regarding issues of diversity at UW-Madison.
As the MultiCultural Student Coalition, we felt compelled to respond to Andrew Carpenter's piece ""Race Deserves No Place in University Admissions."" Carpenter states in his article, ""by focusing on the color of their skin rather than just their achievements, the University administration implants the idea that there might be something different about minority students: they might not be as smart.""
After I read the article ""Race deserves no place in university admissions"" in Tuesday's issue of The Daily Cardinal, I struggled with how to explain the intent of the author. I was caught wholly off-guard by the call for an end to affirmative action.
What is the true measure of quality for an undergraduate education? High faculty-student ratio, smaller classes or more spots in popular lectures? It seems that all of these characteristics could contribute to a single page called ""quality by numbers."" When evaluations of our education are reduced to a lengthy spreadsheet, a crucial qualitative aspect is neglected: What about teaching methods?
Yesterday I was embarrassingly duped, and it felt worse than getting Rick- rolled. Outside of Walgreens on State Street someone handed me a copy of Darwin's ""On the Origin of Species."" The initial act took me completely by surprise, since normally people are pedaling miniature bibles rather than books on scientifically verifiable theories of how the world actually came to be.
As a teaching assistant on campus here who daily observes the way that racism functions within the UW academic community, I wanted to write to express my extraordinary dismay at your willingness to publish Andrew Carpenter's opinion column. I am all for diversity of opinion and First Amendment rights, but one would presume that some editorial discretion would have been warranted in this particular case. To allow those opinions to be disseminated campuswide to an almost lily-white student body is, at best, counterproductive to the university's project of minority recruitment and, at worst, completely alienates minority students and grants legitimacy to divisive racist sentiments to which Madison is certainly no stranger.
Andrew Carpenter's Tuesday column, ""Race deserves no place in university admissions,"" is a poorly-argued embarrassment to the students of the UW campus. The entire piece is uncorroborated conjecture. From his opening claim that ""there are almost no students who pay any attention to race"" to his belief that ""it makes sense to expect minority students to drop out at higher rates than white students,"" Mr. Carpenter's journalistic atrocity is representative of nothing more substantive than his own speculation.
Until last Sunday, one man save Brett Favre was the most talked-about person in the state. Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett kept his mouth shut about his campaign until relatively late in the 2010 gubernatorial race, yet has received more free press than either Republican candidate.
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