The Rice Thresher (Houston, Tex.), Vol. 71, No. 13, Ed. 1 Friday, November 18, 1983 Page: 4 of 24
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THRESHING IT OUT
Marek explains,
needs help
To the editor:
In the past week I have spent a
considerable amount of my time
and effort to explain the actions of
the Rice Program Council to the
student body. I have attended the
Studen; Association meeting on
Monday, I have granted an
interview to The Thresher, and
now I am writing this letter. I hope
that these activities will answer any
questions that the student body
has.
I feel that there is a general
feeling of apathy at this university.
There has been a steady decline in
participation in university-wide
student activities since I was a
freshman. J.R. Barker, who is in
charge of student intramurals,
claims that there has been a 20 to
30 percent decline in participation
in intramural activities. Stan
Barber, night manager at the
RMC, has noticed a decrease in
attendance at many student
activities.
Many of the social and cultural
coordinators of the various
colleges will agree that the
attendance at events is harder to
predict than ever before. This
creates problems for the Rice
Program Council.
1 can see three reasons for this
feeling of apathy or non-
involvement. The first two are
minor; 1 think that the third one is
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The Rice Thresher, November 18, 1983, page 4
the key. The first is the economics.
I believe that people are being
more careful when and where they
send their money. The second is
time constraints. I believe people
are spending more time on their
academics rather than spending it
on extracurricular activities. The
third problem is the design of the
residential college system of this
University.
No, 1 am not against the
residential college system. The
system is a tremendous tool for
making students comfortable at
Rice as soon as they enter the door.
The college system is far better
than having fraternal organiza-
tions on campus because everyone
who enters Rice is assigned to a
college. Because of their design,
fraternal organizations must be
exclusive in their acceptance of
new members.
It is a great feeling to know that
you are already part of a group
once you enter Rice; you are
already accepted. There is a spirit
of unity within the colleges, and
sometimes there is a high level of
rivalry between the colleges.
The college system creates this
spirit within the college, but
destroys a total school spirit for
Rice University. As more and
more colleges become coed, the
colleges have become more and
more introverted, relying on
leaders within the college to
sacrifice their time for the good of
the college alone. This creates a
problem for university-wide
student activates.
The Student Association,
Honor Council, University
Council, and Rice Program
Council have all had these
problems. For some reason (I
don't know why) people seem to
have less free time. When they do
have free time, they would rather
devote it to their college. The result
is that the RPC had very few
people sign up in the spring for
committee chairmanships.
In fact many people who hold
offices in the RPC are also officers
in their individual colleges. David
Ray is a social director for the
RPC and treasurer for Lovett;
Steve Bray is student servies
chairman and vice president of
Sid; Marc Cram is Sid
representative and social director
at Sid. Many other people on the
council hold other college and
university positions or have part-
time jobs. This damages the
amount of time that they can put
into their jobs with the RPC.
I have always seen my role as a
leader as a "hands on" leader. I
have always believed that I should
work beside someone instead of as
a supervisor. I realize that with an
organization as large as the RPC
and with as many constraints on
my time, I cannot always be this
kind of leader. There are many
times that the only function that I
can serve is as a supervisor. This
creates another problem: those to
whom power is delegated must be
willing to work hard at the projects
in their hands.
I am not trying to make
accusations towards other people,
saying that they are creating the
problems of the RPC. Instead I am
trying to explain why some of the
decisions that were made by me
were made at all. I admit that I am
guilty of many crimes against the
Rice Program Council. I did not
get proper input from the students
or the Council itself before
planning some events. I did not
follow the Student Association
constitution requirement of three
signatures on all contracts, and I
did not follow constitutional
guidelines in the appropriation of
funds for certain events.
All three of things I have done in
the past, but I will not do anymore.
I did not do them maliciously; I did
do them because I thought that
they would benefit the Rice
student.
In the past week I have
considered resigning from my
position as RPC president as one
of the simplest solutions to these
problems. I have never felt
completely comfortable about the
RPC, and I have not really enjoyed
working for an organization which
consumes 25 hours a week of my
time and does not function
properly. I also do not need the
extra pressure of the RPC in
addition to the presure that Rice
puts on me with my academic load.
But I decided to continue on with
the job because I do not believe
there is anyone at Rice who would
want to take my place.
There are several changes that
are going to be made internally in
the Rice Program Council, and
several things that the student
body can do:
1) The RPC will be sending out a
survey about which events the
student body would like to see on
campus. This will be done before
the end of the semester. Please fill
it out with your honest comments
and return it.
2) The Rice Program Council is
actively recruiting new members
for any committee. If you have free
time and would be willing to work,
we can put you to work
somewhere.
3) If you have a question or
comment about the RPC or this
letter, direct it to your RPC rep or
me. Constructive criticism is
always welcome. However, if your
comment is intended to be
sarcastic and degrading, then it
deserves to be ignored. I consider
the comments in the misclass
scetion last week directed at me to
be very low class. If you feel that
you can do a better job at this
office, then why didn't you run for
it? I repeat: constructive criticism
is always welcome, degrading
comments will be ignored.
Thank you for your time.
Brian Marek
RPC President
SRC '84
Calhoun cuts at
sports hypocrisy
To the editor:
All right. If we're going to have a
semi-professional football team
here at Rice, let's go about it the
right way. We can recruit like the
big schools if we spend enough
money and break enough rules.
We have the money; $300,000 just
went to show that. But if we are to
have such a football program, let
us not claim that our players will
be "student-athletes" or that they
will be made to meet the same high
standards as the rest of the Rice
student body.
Even now (with a few well-
publicized exceptions) they aren't
capable of doing Rice coursework.
With a major football program of
the type required to be competitive
in the Southwest Conference, Rice
would need to do what the large
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Ekren, Christopher. The Rice Thresher (Houston, Tex.), Vol. 71, No. 13, Ed. 1 Friday, November 18, 1983, newspaper, November 18, 1983; Houston, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth245545/m1/4/: accessed July 18, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; crediting Rice University Woodson Research Center.