The Rice Thresher (Houston, Tex.), Vol. 74, No. 26, Ed. 1 Friday, April 3, 1987 Page: 2 of 24
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Friday, April 3, 1987 THRESHER Opinion
Proposal still too limiting
The curriculum revision committee's long-awaited coherent
minor proposal calls for optional minors that students will
welcome warmly. This single change makes the proposal far better
than its predecessor last fall, but the minor proposal is still more
limiting than it need be.
The committee's report discusses two "sides of campus,"
science-engineering and humanities-social sciences. It allows only
for students majoring in one of these areas to minor in the other.
Each of the two halves of the curriculum, however, seems broad
enough that a student could benefit from a major and a minor in
the same half.
An economics major, for instance, ought to be able to minor in
English: he or she would benefit from doing so just as much as an
engineer would. A math major should be permitted to minor in
biology just as a psychology major can. If minors are to be
optional, and if present distribution requirements are not to be
softened, then only those minors whose courses overlap with a
student's major should be restricted.
The committee has taken an artificial dichotomy and made it
fundamental. Though the terms "S/E" and "academ" are
ingrained in the Rice psyche, these vague and general concepts
should not limit the minors a student can take.
Teaching undervalued
The administration's actions and its words this week state
clearly that it values undergraduate teaching at Rice less than
research.
President Rupp, following recommendations of the
Promotions and Tenure Committee and the Department of
Biology, denied tenure to Dr. Joseph Martin. Rupp did not opt to
offer Martin a two-year extension in which to improve his
publication record, as some had suggested.
The Promotions and Tenure Committee, explaining all of its
decisions this year, wrote in a letter (see right) that in the tenure
process "scholarship has always been critical, teaching very
important,^nd service expected." In the past the administration
has merely said that all these factors contribute to tenure
decisions; now it has ranked them in order of importance.
In fact, despite administrators' assurances, we do not know
whether or not faculty members' teaching records can influence
tenure decisions at all. Excellent teaching evaluations could not
earn one faculty member extra time for research^ and we know of
no cases where good or even borderline researchers have been
denied tenure due to poor teaching, so we have no evidence that
the committee even considers teaching.
Every student recruited has read and heard hype about the
biannual teaching evaluations and their importance in hiring and
promotions. We'd like to see a sign that the hype is true.
We mis-assigned blame
The Thresher was misguided last week in condemning the
author of Rice's summer school bulletin for a self-contradictory
affirmative action statement in the bulletin, and we regret the
error.
The inaccurate statement we criticized is not a matter of one
errant bulletin, but of a general university policy. President Rupp
specified the statement in Policy 821-85, issued in November of
1985: it must be used "in brochures and catalogues directed to
student applicants, academioprogram information, and any other
literature used for recruiting or for general information." We cited
the summer school bulletin, a recent and available example,
because we did not have a complete list of the publications which,
include the statement.
The statement says that Rice does not discriminate—which
suggests that the university judges applicants only on
qualifications—then says Rice policy includes affirmative action.
Federal laws require that pamphlets carry discrimination
disclaimers, but they do not specify the precise wording of the
disclaimers. Rice's current statement is a misuse of language; Dr.
Rupp should revise its wording to make it more correct and more
meaningful.
'Baby M' decision good
William, Elizabeth, and Melissa Stern won a just and deserved
victory Tuesday in a New Jersey courtroom. William and
Elizabeth won custody of Melissa (previously known as "Baby
M") from surrogate mother Mary Beth Whitehead.
Melissa is William Stern's biological daughter by Whitehead;
Stern's wife's health prevents her from having children.
Whitehead agreed to carry the child for $10,000, but decided
during childbirth to renege on the agreement.
The court affirmed the right of mentally competent individuals
to make an agreement, and their subsequent duty to be bound by
that agreement.
RRICULUPCLSTORF.
junior, should
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explains tenure policy
To the editor:
The Promotion and Tenure
Committee of the University
Council would like to thank all
those who took the time recently to
write letters to us and to President
Rupp, or otherwise express their
views on the university's
promotion policy. All submissions
were entered into the record and
were read and seriously considered
by the committee.
Several letters made reference to
"a new policy" or a "recent change
in emphasis by the administra-
tion." This is inaccurate. There is
THRESHING IT OUT
letters to the editor
no "new policy"; there has been no
"recent change in emphasis." For
the past fifteen or twenty years,
Rice University has had a
consistent set of standards
concerning what must be
accomplished in order to earn
tenure. In the view of the
committee, scholarship has always
been critical, teaching very
important, and service expected.
The current debate concerning the
proper balance among these
cigteria for promotion is only the
most recent in a series.
If anything, recent develop-
ments have resulted in a more
structured procedure which makes
certain that all information
concerning an individual is
available to the committee.
Neal Lane, Chairman;
Ronald Stebbings, Secretary;
William Akers, Katherine Brown,
John Freeman, Ira Gruber,
William Howell, Ronald Sass,
William L. Wilson, A1 Van Helden
English language just as foreign
During Mrs. Higgs' 8th grade
Latin class, I decided that not only
was Latin a dead language, but
also the other languages couldn't
be far behind.
Though I was a relatively good
student, my friends and I swore
that if the only thing we could get
out of memorizing declensions and
conjugations was a trip to the
Latin tournament and a toga party
with a bunch of geek Latin
whizzes, we'd rather «-bet on
football instead.
The only way I could escape
from the cold, cruel clasp of Virgil
and Cicero in high school was to
take either French or Spanish. At
my school, that meant French or
Mutzmex; our Spanish teacher,
Mr. Mutzi, had big green spots
under his armpits which he had
cultivated for years, a fake Spanish
accent, and had once been locked
into his classroom by students who
took the doorknob apart and
reversed it so that the lock was on
the outside.
I chose French.
The highlight of my high school
French studies was the third year,
when I took French from Dr.
Dalle. He was a real Frenchman
whose classes were always
exciting, not because of the
language, but because of the vigor
with which he spoke. In Dr. Dalle's
French class jt was dangerous to sit
on the front row, because every
time Dr. Dalle rolled an "r" or
reached back to mSke a
particularly guttural sound, he
wouljl project not only his
SNYDEREMARKS
by Scott Snyder
syllables, but also an unending
supply of saliva.
After the cultural experience of
dodging Dr. Dalle for a year, I had
had enough. I decided to stay in the
States for the rest of my life and to
pick a university with no foreign
language requirement.
I certainly never thought I
would take a language in order to
use ifc.Fate knew better: ironically,"
I'm now studying Korean in order
to travel to Seoul, South Korea
next year.
Not only have I frustrated
myself this semester learning
Korean characters and phrases,
but I've also been shown up by a
Korean kid and have started to
lose my capacity to understand my
own native English.
Linguistics graduate student
Chang-in Lee has been tutoring me
in Korean these last few months,
and when I go over to her house,
her four-year-old son Yung-il
assists. Since my first visit, Yung-il
has translated vocabulary words
and finished my Korean sentences
for me before I have even thought
of what I wanted tq.say. It would
be so much easierlif only I could
watch Korean Sesame Street,
instead of trying to translate
"Where is the US Embassy?" from
a text by the US Foreign Service
Institute.
Yet I know, from my own
experience as a refugee tutor at the
YMCA, that my teacher's task can
be just as frustrating as my own.
The English textbooks we use in
the refugee tutoring program
include strange dialogues about
people with names like "Mrs.
Sponge" who always borrow
money. The books force the tutor"
to explain incomprehensibly fine
points of the English language, like
the difference between "may" and
"can" or between "other,"
"another," and "the other."
I hope to cross cultural barriers
in my study of Korean, but as yet I
still feel like I'm quite far away
from my goal. Last Sunday, I went
to a Korean presbyterian church
with Sid Rich freshman Gerald
Park. Intent on applying my
knowledge of the Korean
language, I listened to the sermon
carefully despite the overwhelming
urge to sleep during the homily. (I
felt this urge even more strongly
than usual since I was the only
person in the congregation not
well-versed in Korean.)
Afterward Gerald asked if I
could understand the sermon.
"Well, I understood a couple of
words."
"Did you hear him say
'Abraham Lincoln"? "
"No, I didn't hear that," I said.
"He said 'Abraham Lincoln'
three or four times."
Having had a first-hand
opportunity <|o apply my Korean,
I've decided that "the best way to
understand another culture is to
spend lots of time studying
American history.
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Greene, Spencer. The Rice Thresher (Houston, Tex.), Vol. 74, No. 26, Ed. 1 Friday, April 3, 1987, newspaper, April 3, 1987; Houston, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth245663/m1/2/: accessed July 18, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; crediting Rice University Woodson Research Center.