The Rice Thresher (Houston, Tex.), Vol. 67, No. 32, Ed. 1 Friday, April 18, 1980 Page: 2 of 40
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Rice's Honor: Problems in the Council
Rice's treasured Honor System depends upon a
properly functioning Honor Council. Students who
sit on the Council must exercise their very
substantial authority both wisely and fairly. The job
is not an easy one. Council members receive little
recognition for the work they do, and make no
mistake, they work very hard.
Something else the council members function
without, however, is supervision. There are no recall
procedures for removing council members, and
more important, there are no ways for students to
know what sort of a job their elected Honor Council
officials are doing. Why? Secrecy regulations
enforced by the Council to defend the personal
reputations of accusing and accused students serve a
second function of ensuring that examinations of the
quality of work done by individual council members
are made very difficult to perform.
This secrecy almost certainly does more harm
than ggod. When preparing this week's article on the
Honor Council (see page 1), Managing Editor
Richard Dees heard from source after source that
Council members' reluctance to discuss particular
Council policies and procedures protected the image
of the Council as effectively as it protected the
reputations of students involved in Honor System
cases. Furthermore, the secrecy regulations feed an
unhealthy 'we really just answer to ourselves'
attitude endemic to any small organization but
particularly dangerous in a group such as the
Council whose work affects so many people.
Though this policy of secrecy has hampered our
research, hours of interviews have yielded a picture
of the Honor Council which we consider to be
accurate: its activity this year has been flawed — in
one case very seriously — but its overall
performance has been adequate. Also, at no point
has the integrity or dedication of the Council's
members been questioned.
This said, the fact remains that there are serious
problems in the ways the Council goes about its
business. The Council does not view itself as an
adversary body, which it really is; Council members
often fall into a cynicism which leads them to view
defendants (Accused students") as guilty until
proven innocent; and the Council has taken a mutely
defensive posture this year in response to
constructive criticism of its practices. All of these
problems rest in the attitudes of Council members
towards the Council's role in relation to the rest of
the University.
Important among these attitudes is a seeming
reluctance to admit that honest error occurs in some
Council decisions. This attitude is troublingly
manifested in a long-standing Council sentencing
policy that grants — for the same offense — heavier
punishments to students who plead innocent but are
found guilty than to students who plead guilty in the
first place. Council members explain this by noting
that students who plead innocent but are found
guilty have, presumably, broken their Honor pledge
twice — once in the offense and once in lying to the
Council —while a guilty-pleading student has
broken it only once, in committing the offense.
Besides radically limiting the right of a defendant to
a trial, however, this policy implies a Council self-
image of infallibility that is inappropriate to any
judicial body which must base many of its decisions,
as the Council must, upon circumstantial or
inferential evidence. (Over and over we heard
Council members say that if ten reasonable people
thought somebody was guilty, then he was guilty.
We even heard this from Council members who were
very critical of colleagues who would vote with the
majority, even to convict, when they couldn't make
up their minds about a defendant's guilt or
innocence!)
Redefinition of the role of the ombudsmen and
expansion of the training for these posts could go far
in mitigating some of the most damaging effects of
these problem attitudes. Ombudsmen should serve
defendants as advisor-advocates who provide moral
support as well as procedural information. To do
this, ombudsmen will need better training and
formal procedural guidelines than are presently
provided for them.
If there is a lesson in this for Rice students outside
the Council, it is that Honor Council elections are
vastly more important than they are usually taken to
be. One must ask not only if candidates are honest
and decent, but if they are strong in the face of
ridicule from those who disagree with them. It is
clear that weak and acquiescing personalities have
no place on a fair and wise Honor Council.
We urge the Council to consider these questions
and suggestions. We will welcome their response to
our particular criticisms, and we look forward to
hearing their proposals for resolving the attitudinal
and procedural problems which now limit their
fairness and effectiveness.
—Matt Muller
Science courses for nonscientists too scarce
Even though good reasons exist in boih cases, the
unavailability of Math 107-108 and Physics 141-142
point up a serious and continuing problem with
Rice's curriculum.
The two courses, one titled "The Role of
Mathematics in Civilization" and the other
nicknamed "Physics for Poets," are among Rice's
more successful attempts 'to teach science to
nonscience students. Neither will be offered next
year, however, because of staff shortages and low
enrollments (see story, page 7).
Teaching science courses (or courses about
science) to nonscience students is a difficult matter,
more difficult probably than teaching science to
scientists. Still, this task is clearly one of Rice's
educational responsibilities, and is recognized as
such in the University's distribution requirements.
However, if excellence is our measure, we are falling
far short of discharging our self-defined
responsibilities. Do "Space Colonies" or "Ocean
Motion" really teach what the distribution
requirements intend? Are students in these and
similar courses exposed to the structure of scientific
analysis, or to basic scientific theories and laws?
Not really, and we all know it. The problem in fact
extends bevond this particular issue. Last year a
Faculty Committee which included Professors
Brotzen, Spears and Matusow released a report
concerning enhancement of the Rice education. "We
sense a growing mood of disenchantment with the
curriculum, a mood which we share," said the
committee (they went on in the same report to
recommend dumping the distribution requirements
entirely and returning to "some form of" a core
curriculum).
The "mood of disenchantment" is appropriate.
Rice's curriculum requirements, in the absence of
any clearly articulated guiding statement of their
purpose, seem arbitrary and useless. We need to sit
down and ask ourselves just what we intend our
curriculum requirements to accomplish — because
at the moment no one among us really seems to
know.
And the question of science courses for
nonscience students? Until we can re-evaluate the
existing curriculum requirements we ought at least
to make them work as well as we can.
It is time for academic administrators above the
departmental level to begin supporting development
of courses which will find new ways to teach science
to nonscience students.
—Matt Muller
THRESHING-IT-OUT
Fired DJ protests KTRU
management policies
To the Editor:
I was recently fired from my
position as a DJ at KTRU. No
fault was found with the quality or
content of my show. I was told I
was dismissed because my
"attitude" differed from that of
other station members. Further-
more, I was dismissed by a single
person, Rich Koehler, in a self-
proclaimed "unilateral action." I
had received only positive
feedback from listeners and, again,
no criticism was made about the
way I worked over the- ciir. The
only thing I did wrong was fail to
agree with Rich Koehler.
It seems to me that KTRU is run
by a small inner circle of people
who do what they want to with the
station. Every Rice student pays $4
to fund the station, and that
amounts to about $10,000 a year. I
think that the operators of KTRU
tend to forget this student support
and act like they own the station.
I had two lengthy discussions
with Koehler following my firing,
and he could never give any real
reason for my dismissal. He could
only fault my "attitude" because he
didn't agree with my tastes.
I just don't feel that one person
at KTRU should have the power to
get rid of someone else for a purely
contrived reason. And as long as
this continues no new ideas or
opinions will be put into station
policy and KTRU will continue to
cater to a small minority of the
Rice student body.
Kevin Bartol
Castrating the MOB?
The MOB is going to get a new band director. He's stepping into
a tough position—maybe an impossible one, at the moment.
Shepherd School Dean Allan Ross, by all accounts a
thouroughly decent and dedicated administrator, has said he wants
to reduce the MOB shows' "offensiveness" without "cutting out
their satire."
"Every week last fall, I would get calls from people upset by
MOB shows," he said.
Ross's problem probably runs deeper than he thinks, however.
My dictionary defines satire as "the use of ridicule in exposing,
denouncing, or deriding vice, folly, etc." Not so good, and it gets
worse. Ridicule is defined as "speech or action intended to cause
contemptuous laughter at a person or thing; derision."
Lots of people watch MOB shows. Some of them undoubtedly
are partial to the people or things catching the short end of the
MOB's satire. Their response? Call up the administration and
complain. If they're important, they'll get listened to. Sooner or
later the MOB director will hear about it.
And the outcome? Well, even though VP for Administration Bill
Akers says he wouldn't censor and "we want what the students
want," some former MOB scriptwriters tell a different story. Says
one: "The administration's presence is definitely felt. It especially
was felt this year. Things got to the point where we would castrate
our own shows before we put them on."
So, it looks like this. Either the administration will have to be
willing to explain to angry citizens and alums that it leaves its
hands off the MOB scripts entirely, or else it will probably be
forced into washing out so much of the satire that humor will
become an anachronism in MOB shows.
This could be wrong, of course. I hope it is, and wish the best of
luck to the MOB's next director, whoever he or she may be. But if
things aren't any funnier next year than they were this year, we'll all
have a few guesses why. Matt Muller
Recycled rhetoric
Professor R. John Rath's valedictory address Tuesday night—
"From Versailles to Tehran and Kabul"—was not comforting, nor
was it meant to be. The distinguished historian recited a long litany
of facts and figures which led inevitably to the conclusion that the
U.S. is now facing a "serious crisis" of multiple dimensions, our
response to which will determine whether America can long remain
"a great power or even a democracy."
Unfortunately, Rath's speech was also, contrary to the effect
intended, not inspiring. Its clichti conclusion—"We will have to
tighten our belts, walk more and eat less, until it hurts and hurts
and hurts"—is certainly correct in the sense that hard times lie
ahead no matter what. But empty catchwords of conservation
delievered to a sedate ivory-tower audience will not avert by one
iota*the all-too-real approaching disasters identified by Rath. In
its exhortatory remarks the Provost's Lecture was simply parroting
the same insubstantial truisms espoused by every mainstream
politician of the last decade.
I dare say that not a single policymaking official in the United
States of America would disagree with Rath's judgments that we
must end foreign oil dependency, strengthen the dollar, and regain
the trust of our allies and the respect of our enemies. But, as
Peanuts' Charlie Brown is wont to say, "Now that I know that,
what do I do?" In fact, the cartoon character's plaint is the real
unanswered question that stymies—and may soon throttle—the
American system of government. Our representatives know the
general cures to what ails us, but they cannot agree on any specific
steps to take because legislative "leaders" have proven time and
again that they cannot even lead their own branches of
government, much less the country.
All that the citizens hear, as we heard again Tuesday night with
Professor Rath, are well-intentioned speakers "bringing in the
violins." Meanwhile, Rome burns. When Rath asked rhetorically
whether America has the ability to remain a great, free, democratic
country, I found myself shaking my head "no." —Rolf Asphaug
iE
THRESHB?
MATTHEW MULLER
Editor
JAY OLIPHANT
Business Manager
Assistant Editors Amy Grossman, Ueri Snider,
Anita Gonzalez, Andy Hathcock, John VanderPut, Laura Rohwer
News Staff Allison Foil, Michael Trachtenberg,
Carl Winstead, Kathy Mitchell, Pam Pearson, Jay Barkidale, Bill Bonner,
Sarah Herbert, R.B. Johnson, Lela Smith, Jay Barkidale, Linda Boue,
Chaz Wampold, Eugene Domack, Augusta Barone. Ron Stutet,
Karen Strecker, Dorothy Willis, Ken Klein, Rum Coleman, Robin Baringer
Fine Arts Staff Steve Sailer, Uary cote,
Jim Fowler, Nicole Van Den Heuvel, Scott Solis, Carol Owen, Thomas Peck,
Thom Glidden, Gaye Gilbert, Amanda Lewis, Mehran Gouran,
John Heaner, ^ Bradford Moody
Sports Staff Duane Berry, Donald Buckholt,
Michelle Gillespie, Norma Gonzales, Jean Hobart, Ken Klein, Cindy McCabe
Tami Ragosin, Byron Welch, Rich Whitney, Alison F. Whittemore
Science Staff Sue Taylor, Joel Brazeale,
Bob Skocpol, Debbie Wenkert, Margaret Schauerte, Greg Greenwell, Owen Wilson
Photography Staff Jay Bauerle, Robert Bohrer,
Buster Brown, T.W. Cook, Bruce Daviet, Dingbat a.k.a. Michael Gladu, Janie Haimoni,
Bruce hessicr, Jeff McGee, Mike Smith, Paul Williamsoii, Wunderwood
Art •. Harold Nebon
Production Staff Gaye Gilbert, Ann Betley,
Kelvin Thompson, Pam Peanon. Ruth Hillhouse, Vikki Kaplann, Ron Stute>,
Lori Huini, Mark Linimon, Dianne Frame
Circulation Rob Rogers, Vikki Kaplan, Chaijean Heard
Copyright * 1980 Th« Rtee Tbreaher. All rights reserved.
The Rice Thresher, April 18, 1980, page 2
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Muller, Matthew. The Rice Thresher (Houston, Tex.), Vol. 67, No. 32, Ed. 1 Friday, April 18, 1980, newspaper, April 18, 1980; Houston, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth245439/m1/2/: accessed June 19, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; crediting Rice University Woodson Research Center.