The Rice Thresher (Houston, Tex.), Vol. 77, No. 12, Ed. 1 Friday, November 17, 1989 Page: 2 of 16
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2 FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 17, 1989 THE RICE THRESHER
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Rice's chances for Summit
helped by SA petition
The following letter to President George Bush, requesting the
selection of Rice as the location of the 1990 Economic Summit, was
written by Student Association Senator Spencer Yu.
Mr. President:
We, the students of Rice University, sincerely request that
our campus be selected as the location of the 1990 Economic
Summit. As students, we are proud and excited that Rice has
been chosen as a potential site for this event The 1990 Summit
will be of special importance as the dramatic changes in Eastern
Europe emphasize the need for a coordinated policy among the
Western democracies. We believe that Rice University would
provide the ideal setting for this potentially historic event.
Indeed, Rice is a beautiful campus with a tranquil Old World
ambiance that provides a welcome contrast to the bustling me-
tropolis "beyond the hedges." In fact, Rice is one of the few
universities in the world that can boast that it has more trees
than students. Rice possesses excellent facilities and our cen-
tral location in the great city of Houston allows easy access to
theTexas Medical Center, the Houston Art District, the conven-
tion center, and Johnson Space Center-NASA.
Furthermore, with today's increasing emphasis on improv-
ing American education, it would be most appropriate and
symbolic that the Summit be held at one of the nation's top
academic institutions, Rice University. Not only do we have
excellent academics and an ideal campus, but also an energetic
and enthusiastic student body that actively contributes to the
Rice environment.
The students are aware of your many ties to our university,
and we greatly appreciate the contributions you and members
of your administration have made to Rice. We see this Eco-
nomic Summit as an opportunity for Rice to give something
back for all your efforts. In fact, the students will be willing to go
to any length to accommodate this important event.
We hope that we have conveyed through this letter the
desire of the students of Rice University that this institution be
selected as the site of the 1990 Economic Summit.
Sincerely,
The Student Body of Rice University
Yu and other members of the Student Association are currently
circulating petitions attached to the letter around campus in an effort
to garner as many student signatures as possible. We hope that
everyone will sign the form, for bringing the Economic Summit to
Rice would be a wondrous occurrence for our campus.
With monumental events occurring daily, hourly even, in places
such as Germany, Poland, Hungary and El Salvador, next summer's
Summit will certainly be a historic encounter. The leaders of the
Western democracies will be forced to deal with issues that were
unforeseeable even a month ago. The Economic Summit will be a test
to every leader's political acumen and savvy, and it would be a
fascinating thing to observe.Obviously, the benefits to Rice would
also be profound. This tiny school would suddenly be known to
people across the world. Money would pour into the campus, and
never again would those of us from the East Coast be forced to explain
exactly where our school is located.
The decision on where to house the Summit will most certainly be
made on factors far larger than the input of the undergraduate and
graduate students at Rice University. However, by quickly respond-
ing to news that Rice was under consideration by creating a petition,
the Student Association deserves credit for taking every effort to
make certain that Rice will remain under consideration.
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Views on Taming of Rice' article
To the editors:
Jay Yates' claim that Rice is
quickly becoming tamed in the No-
vember 3 Thresher raises some per-
tinent questions about our univer-
sity, but his argument fails to look at
both the effect Rice's taming will
have on its future and the possibility
that Rice is only a small example of
much larger restraints.
Acknowledging the change in
homecoming elections, the removal
of the dreaded word "Faggies" from
the Rally Club's banner, and the con-
troversy caused by Sammy the Owl's
running on the field during the
Texas A&M football game, I wonder
where the next restriction will occur.
KTRU seems to be a prime candi-
date , for it does play some songs with
words worse than "Faggie."
Also, the misclass may find its
position in jeopardy, since its vulgar-
ity does distract from Rice's escala-
tion to the Harvard of the South. In
addition, the health committee's dis-
tributing condoms in order to make
students more aware of how to pre-
vent AIDS certainly has no place at
an institution such as Rice, because
condoms only promote lecherous
behavior.
THE EDITOR
Letters
11-7 ®f«B,
On that note, NOD should be
banned as well. By exaggerating, I
hope to prove a point: when do the
constraints on Rice end? As of now,
the end seems to be when Rice's
culture, students, and habits are
identical to those of Texas A&M,
SMU, and Baylor. In other words,
when Rice is no longer RICE.
I congratulate Yates on awaken-
ing many of us to the changes here
on our campus. But we must look
beyond how these changes preclude
us from drinking and dancing at
Esperanza for an extra hour and on
to the effects these changes have on
Rice's future, and more importantly,
how these changes are reflective of
the nation as a whole.
Rice is not what I thought it was in
high school or what I want it to be
now, for restraints exist which I
never imagined. Are we not Rice? Or
are we Baylor?
Rodney Gibbs
Brown '92
To the editors:
Yates commented that NOD will
become "Night of Dessert" under
the re-adjustment he foresees. This
year's NOD committee has done a
good job in taking steps to prevent
the violence that could accompany
the event He also complains about
the increased number of keys re-
quired to get in and out of build-
ings—another attempt to increase
security.
He takes the university to task for
not promoting "Faggies" at the Bon-
fire on the Quad Banner. What about
the students and faculty such a ban-
ner would offend? Surely students at
a top-ranked university can come up
with better ways to taunt Aggies and
inspire school spirit than one which
insults a group of people who already
suffer harrassmenL
It seems that unless Rice students
mandate unacceptable risk for as-
sault and degrade their fellow stu-
dents, Rice will be too tame for Jay
Yates.
However, that which he finds to
be a trend toward tameness at Rice is
to many people a move toward a Rice
culture that is less offensive and
more appropriate for a university.
Ellen Forman, Vicky King
Jones *91
Fix room temperatures
To the editors:
It is 5 a.m. right now and I can't
sleep so I am writing to you out of
sheer desperation. I am writing in
regard to the room temperature in
the Hanszen Old Section and parts of
Wiess College.
My roommate has grappled all
semester long with Bob Mathis, di-
rector of food and housing, but to no
use. When the outdoor temperature
drops below 80 degrees, our heat
comes on at night and stays on for
the duration of the "cold spell." As a
result, many nights, when we have
been sleeping peacefully in an air
conditioned room, we wake up to
find the heat blowing. Usually on
nights like those, we wake up sweat-
ing profusely.
Tonight is a similar night; how-
ever, we went to bed with no air on at
all since it is still programmed to
send us heat since a couple of days
ago the outdoor temperature fell
from 80 to 76 degrees. It is miserable
to try to study, get ready in the morn-
ing and sleep in this room. I am a
section representative in the
Hanszen Old Section and I know I am
not alone on this issue.
During these cold spells, we leave
our windows open during the day in
an attempt to make our room bear-
able. At night we must close these
windows in fear of crime. Because
we have them open during the day,
though, mosquitoes are slowly but
surely taking over our room. We
have had the place exterminated
twice already, but the mosquitos are
always back in a matter of days.
To avoid being eaten alive, I keep
my bedcovers up to my chin and lie
there sweltering in the hot room If I
remove the covers to cool off, I am
one massive mosquito bite the next
morning and I lose sleep scratching.
Last week, I opted for mosquito
protection and woke up with seven
bites along one side of my face.
Another morning, one eye was swol-
len halfway shut from a bite on my
eyelid.
Lorie Hutensky
Hanszen '92
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Kahn, Greg & Leedy, Sarah J. The Rice Thresher (Houston, Tex.), Vol. 77, No. 12, Ed. 1 Friday, November 17, 1989, newspaper, November 17, 1989; Houston, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth245735/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.