 

The Grinnell

Scarlet and Black

President Leggett listens from the laboratory
desk as Dean of Administration Waldo Walker

tees on the budget,

Friday
November 12 , 1971

Volume 80 Number 12

 

speaks to the faculty about his report to the Trus-

photo by Jon Davis

 

lSPIRG Funding Plan In limbo

New student power, in the form of
iSPIRG (pronounced iceberg), may
come to Grinnell if students decide
to join the Iowa Student Public In-
terest Research Group.

Basically a studentsfunded and dis
reeled operation, ISPIRG will ems
ploy tun—time lawyers, scientists
and researchers to act on areas of
concern, such as environmental is
sues, delivery of health care, sexual
and racial discrimination, housing
problems, and consumer protection

Although most students agree that
lSPlRG is a good and workableidea,
many leel the iunding operation
should be handled in another manner.
The present ISPIRG plan proposes
that a $3 lee per school yearbe col—
lected along With the tuition At the
University of Northern Iowa students
objected to the procedure because it
assumes the approval ofthe majority

and it involves theworkofcolleciing
a refund if a student does notwantto
participate in lSPlRG. Colleges in
general have been hesitant to accept
the ISPIRG funding plan because it
might also endanger their tax-
exempt status.

Phil Sasich explained, “The lowa
State Board of Regents will not let
the present lunding plan go through,
so that now the lSPlRG plan is in
limbo. Nothing is happening here
at Grinnell until something definite
at the State level, The best thing
students could do is read the “pro»
posed Structure" bulletin all the
dorm presidents have.”

Petitioning of the student body is
the next step in the lSPIRG adop-
ticn plan. Volunteers will attempt to
sign up over 50 per cent or the stu-
dent body, although the goal will he
tor 100 per cent. By doing this, the

campus will have shown a majority
of the student body wants lSPlRG on
campus.

If accepted, Grinnell will elect a
local ISPIRG board to “solicit the
cooperation of students, raculty, and
groups outside the academic come
munity when setting priorities and
carrying on necessary reserach,
“in addition, local boards will elect
from their membership a statewide
lSPlRG board of directors. The
statement board of directors will
determine policy. allocate funds,
and hire and direct the professions
al staff.”

Local boards are not under the
control or the Washington, Dc
Public interest Group which was
started by Ralph Nader. instead, a
studenlrelected board or directors
will control its own team of ad—
vocates.

Academic Pressure Considered

Several meetings are taking place
here to discuss whether students are‘
pushing themselves too hard intheir
studies.

The meetings have grown out of
a concern expressed by house
president Phil Sasich at last Mons
day’s Joint Board meeting. Weds
nesday a group or students met
with Dean Wall to discuss their
concern

According to Phil, students gen-
erally seem to have a lot more
work this yearl He said that his
observation was not an “isolated
perception,” because he had asked
several other people whether they
had noticed the same thing. He and
the others are Concerned about the
possibility that many students are
working themselves to the breaks
ing point. He says several freshr
men in his hall have been studying
so much lately that “they haven't
watched a sunset.”

Library Use

There are signs that people are
working harder this year than last,
Library circulation in October was
almost fifty percent higher than last
October, and the reference Staffhas
been kept very busy meeting re
quests of students in all four classA
es.

Mr. Obermiller, Director ofACas
demic Advising, is concernedabout
the number of students who are air
ready putting in all night study ses
sions, with finals almost a month

away.

Student advisers discussed the
fact that certain courses seem to
expect an unreasonable amount of
work from students for the credit
they receive. They are planning to
meet with certain instructors to

see why the workload is so great,
and encourage students who feel
they are in difﬁculty and over—
worked to contact the professor to
explain the problem, They hoped
all students and professors would
give this matter some thought.

New Policy.. Further Delay

The Executive Council, meeting
October 27, again changed its his
formation dissemination method.
The new method will result in an
even further delay in making Coun~
cll actions available to the Campus
Community.

Prior to the October Z'lthdecision,
abridged minutes of each meeting
were furnished to the SM! by Dean
Wall’s ofllce each Thursday morn»
ing, for publlcatlon the next day -
a total delay of nine days ebetween
a total delay of nine days between
meeting and publication.

The new policy will add an addi-
tional {our days to this delay. Since
the Campus Memo (where the ab
ridged minutes will now appear on
the second Tuesday following the
meeting) often is no released until
Wednesday morning, the delay may
well total a full two weeks.

Also at the October 27th meet
ing, the Council attempted lo de,
fine its role more clearly as an
administrative advisory body Its
new plan is designed primarily to

expedite discussion by expedient:
such as eliminating consideration oi
alternatives which for one reason
or another are obviously not viable,

The Council continued its discus-
sion of laculty size, with Mr. Jones
presenting the case for an eighth
faculty member, in the History De
partment. to be a specialist in Far
Eastern History. The motion was
tabled for discussion after the Tr-
ustees meeting.

Dean Wall also presented the paper
“Problems of the Academically qu-
alified Faculty Wife” for Council
discussion

Faculty Discusses
Planning, Raises

by Anne Waller

Discussion at this week’s faculty
meeting centered around long range
planning for Grinnell College and
ways the taculty could and should be
involved in this planning.

This discussion was directed to-
wards a motion to give the duty or
considering long range planning to
the Executive Council; this motion
passed despite the personal opposi-
tion of President Glenn Leggett. A
second motion, to assign to the
Executive Council the duty of exams
mug and making recommendations
on the general items olthecollege’s
total current operations budget was
discussed, but no action was taken,

Degree to Bucky Fuller?

Dean Waldo Walker announced the
status of faculty raises for this
year He stated that the trustees
had approved procedures to be {ole
lowed depending on president Nixs
on’s directives regarding the wages
price freeze, Faculty will be notir
fied as soon as a decision has been
made,

The faculty recommended Buck-
minster Fuller to the trustees for
an honorary degree contingent on a
similar recommendation from the
Executive Council. Mr. Fuller is
the first choice of the senior class
for this spring’s commencement
speaker.

Mr. Beryl Clotfelter, chairman oi
the faculty, began the practice or
distributing a summary of the Ex-
ecutive Council’s activities prior to
each faculty meeting, and heoffered
the opportunity for questions or
discussion of the proceedings. This
practice has been set up to increase
communication between the faculty
as a whole and the Executive Coun»
cil, thereby makingthelatteramore
effective body.

Same Old High Standards

Dean Joseph Wall then attempted to
reassure the faculty that the Search
Committees for new black and
women faculty did not mean that the
college was lowering its standards
[or faculty. He called the fears of
some that the college would hire
simply on the basis or sex or race
an insult to the institution,

Wall repeated that the search com-
mittees are simply resource com-
mittees, and that finaldecisions with
respect to appointments would be
made as they always have been, The
search committees are to insure an
exhaustive Search for newfaculty in
areas we have nollooked into before,
in order to correct the situation of
unbalance that currently exists here.

Finding new sources for faculty
candidates is a means of insuring
that the college has more than good
intentions for correcting this situa-
tion. This action has been under»
taken with the hope of avoiding a
situation similar to that at North-
western University. There they are
under court order to hire only wo-
men. Some revealing ligures were
cited with respect to women: in
1941 about 40% of the faculty was
temale. Today, thirty years later,
only 9% is temale.

Genius Mendoza
Among the other legislation and
announcements Monday, Mr. Melts
doza was honored by President Legs
gett with the title of Mechanical

Brownoui, Blackout - Study Break!

gradually dimmed until they were
switched off. The transformer was
a total loss, but power was re
stored to the campus after about

For the first time all year, the
entire Grinnell student body was on
a study break at one time.

Last evening, one of the tranSr
formers at the heating plant caught
fire and burned; as it burned lights

half an hour. Grinnell students,
who had been hoping tor a longer
study break, returned to theirbooks,

Genius for his outstanding ability
to handle the fussy projectorscreen
in Science 17L

The two proposals cited earlier
received quite a bit or attention.

One professor suggested that the
Executive Council’s new duty of
longrrange planning could occupy the
Council during those moments when
it is sitting around looking for some-
thing to do. Most comments, hows
ever, were more serious.

Take a Look Ahead

The proponents oi the motion cited
the importance or long-range plans
ning to the viability of an institution
such as ours, and a fear that such
planning had been lacking inthepast
few years at Grinnell. By instruct-
ing the Executive Council to con»
sider long-range planning they hoped
both to make this type of thinking a
priority and to involve the faculty
in such matters. Mr. Legged conic
merited that the Executive Council
was already making long~range
planning in its day to day decisions;
furthermore, any special discussion
or long range planning could hardly
be worked into an agenda already full
with essential business.

The college has been thinking pri-
marily in terms of its immediate
survival, it was noted, and thus has
had neither the time nor the ability
actually to think in terms of h-E
years. Many faculty obviously felt
that long-range planning is not being
done to any significant extent--some
said it was not being done at all--
and the motion was passed by an
overwhelming majority. Some who
may be more pragmatic about the
Executive Council feel that the Coun-
cil will not have the time or pro-
clivity to seriously consider long
range plans as such.

See Faculty Page 6
Evaluate Course

Survey Poll

by John Wylie

Statistics on the utilization of the
Credit/Fail option and an evaluation
of the teacher evaluation of last
spring were discussed by the EPC
in two meetings during the past week.

Mr. Neizger in the Nov. l meeting
presented the Committee with the
results of a stody conducted on pos
sible correlation between the GPA
and utilization of the Credit/Fail
option. It had been expected by some
people that this study would show
that students with higher GPA’S
were manipulating their grades by
selectively using Credit/Fail, now-
ever, the results indicated that there
was no correlation between GPA and
Credit/Fail enrollment.

Carolyn Ashbaugh then appeared
before the Committee to discuss her
“no grades” proposal, Thediscus-
sion continued until 12:25 when a
“mad dash for lunch” abruptly ended
the meeting. Action onthis and other
proposals was deferred tor further
discussion at the next regular
Thursday meeting.

in a special meeting held Tuesday,
Mr. Holtois appeared before the
Committee to present the results
of the evaluation of the faculty eval-
uation conducted last spring The
survey was mostly inconclusive
(due, in part, to the fact that only
45% of the questionnaires were
turned in), although the final ques-
tion rated Grinnell faculty members
as "above average”. Again, a final
recommendation on the use of such
surveys was continued until the
Thursday meeting.

 

