Elie ﬁwrlet one iiéldra

QEhituriaI

$8.
Give $1.50

It is not difficult to support an organization like ISPIRG.
Established in reaction to the realization that in present—
day American society inequities and certain misallocation
of resources exist, the organization through investigation and
lobbying hopes to protect the public interest and provide a
weight which will help to counterbalance institutions which act
not in the public’s interest but rather in their own. Active in
the areas of environmental conservation, legislative respon~
sibility, consumer protection and agricultural reform, the group
shows promise of being able to effectively lobby for the kinds
of policy changes which we have long supported.

Such work, unfortunately, requires more than verbal praise.
It also requires the financial support of students throughout
the state, and the idealistic and liberal student, like every-
one else, shows his true form when he is asked to dig into
his pocketbook.

That decision is difficult, despite the virtual illslgnificance
of the-$1.50 the organization is asking as a contribution. One
generally tends to pay his own funds only for something which
will benefit him directly, and it is exactly here where ISPIRG
is the weakest, for it works not for the benefit of students
in particular, but for the benefit of the entire society.

The welfare of society is not easy to personalize. It is a
nebulous concept, hard to define and difficult to visualize»
but important all the same. It is, we like to believe, what we
have been'idealistically fighting for for many years. When we
demonstrated for peace in Vietnam it was, we said, not for
personal gain but for the poor Vietnamese people themselves,
victimized as they were by constant aerial attacks and the
unrelenting disruption of their daily lives. When we lobbied
for environmental measures we were not doing it for our own
good, but rather were trying to improve the ecological condi~
tion of the whole society. When we campaigned for George
McGovern we expected to gain no personal benefit, but hoped
to change policies we interpreted as destructive for the whole
country.

The positive check-off plan for the funding of ISPIRG during
the second semester offers us an ideal chance to prove our
convictions, not only with verbal support and liberal rhetoric
but with financial backing of what must be the worthiest
cause we have seen in quite a while. Our decisions regard—
ing contributions to ISPIRG will show, because of their finanr
cial nature, our real feelings about the reforms we have been
so verbal about.

Stern- Finance Resignation;
SGA 'Unworkable Bureaucracy'

(Ed. note: The following was sent

last week to SGA President Russ
McGregor and soil Treasurer Ed
Hirsch, and has been printed here
at the request of its author.)

To the Editors:

student government at Grinnell has
degenerated this year into an unr
workable bureaucracy presided over
by a group of people more inter-
ested in argument than responsible
action. The Finance Committee,
which previously tried to promote
fiscal responsibility, has been drawn
into this mire, As an example, under
the prawns Treasurer and Chair—

Kinlner- Error
last Week

To the Editors:

in your article entitled “l6 FaCr
ulty Receive Notices,” published in
the December 8 issue of the 5&3,
you quote Dean Wall as saying that
“The letters are not absolutely final
for faculty whose contracts are not
renewed," and then continue in your
own words to add:

unless the person involved aliempls
to present additional information in
his favor the lelter rcpreselltslhe
official decision of the Executive
Council,

This latter statement involved a
misconception which i think it worth
while to correct.

in personnel matters the Execu-
tive Council merely advises the
President concerning matters of
hiring, retention, promotion, andter
nure. According to the Bylaws of
the Trustees, as Well as in fact
in working situations, the Presi»
dent does not treat the Council’s
recommendations as more than ad-
vice. It is therefore quite mislead-
ing to say that the action represents
the official decision of the Council.
The action represents the Willofthe
President after consultation with the
Council, whose advice both can be
and is rejected when the President
wishes to do so,

Philip L. Kintner
Professor of History

Social Committee: Coordination

by Shifteh Karimi
“The job of the Social Coordinating

has also been plans for passing a
proposal concerning town's people

Committee is to provide sufficient
activities and entertainments on
campus through the use of Student
Activities l-‘ee, which is $45 per
semester,“ commented Elliott Lew-
is, the Social Coordinator, inanS&E
interview this week.

An increase in the budget seems
to be the main solution to many of
the Social Coordinating Committee’s
problems and the answer to many
dissatisfaction: on the part of the
students. “The present buget is not
sufficient for famous concerts,”
said Elliott

Elliott's greatest task is to pro-
vide enough activities in order to
keep everyone busy during the week-
ends and not necessarilyat the same
time and place. To this he said,
“The campus is not designed for
everyone to be at the same place
at the same time; therefore, I have
to scatter people around with Of-
fering them variety of events.”

Elliott says that his job involves
a lot of "running around.” “I not
only plan and decide for the active
ities, i help with the setting up for
the concerts and time consuming
work of this sort.” This is where
personal interest and enthusiasm a7
bout the iob has its biggest influ»
ence on him.

The major plan of the Committee
for next semester as viewed by El-
liott consists of four main con-
certs in addition to the usual North
and South Lounge programs. There

Applications for the student
positions on the Office of Com.
munity Rights will be accepted
by the student Government As-
sociatiori until December 21.

admissions charge, as an additional
financial source.

The Coordinator works closely with
Miss Dentel (Activities Counselor,)
Lucinda Ellert, Scott Mason, Robert
Ruhl (Concerts,) Tim Golbuff (Mov—
ies,) Grace Cameron, (Coffee
House,) and Sybille Scott (North
Lounge.)

Miss Georgia Dentel, who is the
Activities .Counselor, is also the
Program Director of the College
Forum. Althoughdeclsions concern
ing the selection of the sociaievents
on campus are made by the students
in the Committee, Miss Dentelis the
person who makes the actual phone
calls and has contact With mayor
hookers. “She sometimes has to do
a little bargaining to get the work
done,” Elliott remarked.

The Film Chairman, Tim Golbuff
has spent many hours of his life
watching movies and occasionally
making some.

llis decisions on films are mainly
based on the suggestions from the
students, the catalogs, anti the $3000
budget limit per semester. “l have
tried to select and balance it wide
variety of films: Foreign, heavy,
and entertaining, which cost from
320 to $300,” commented Tim,

The Coffee House, a non-profit
student service is an independent
function of the Social Coordinating
Committee,

Grace Cameron, the director ofthe
Coffee House expresses disappoint-
ment with the lack of patronization,
economic problems, and the little
gratification that she receives.

“The Coffee House should be a
place where people come and meet,
hopefully be entertained, and enjoy

the advantages of home—made
goods," Grace remarked.

She also believes that the lack of
response on the part of the students
may result in “cutting back of the
hours, and eventually the closing
or the Coffee House."

(_\,

Speeding Peiis

Dashing through the Show
‘Cause panic's on the way

o'er the norms we go
Speeding every day

Books and papers sing
Making schedules light

0 what fun it is to write
Before the morning light

0 speeding pells
Speeding polls

Speeding every day

so get some rest,
Taie vitamins
And eat some food today

780!) Jacobs

—

05hr ®riilhtll
Qtnrltt nub ffélhrll

Th: Grlnhell Scarlet Ind Black is lna stimuli news

paper of Gllnnull college, punitsnnn weakly unto
the college is In Session by hi cnnncu College
Commtliee on Student rnniuauans and Harlin rat.
lorlal opinions an not necusnliy when the views
of no student body, Ilciliiy, or aamnisiuuan hf
Crlnnell College naunn from the Surlel and
mack cannot be ”produced on publication wiihnul
the express (alumni of the editor,

Second Class postage mm, cnnnui, rm shin,

[Dl'loir . ,
Min/tomb EDITOR
corx EDIToR

nusmrss nnulorn

uonDaKcnils
. .ncny Wiesnrr
, .Jamlwylie
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man of the Finance Committee, all
charge accounts at the Bookstore
were closed to prevent overdrawing
on the SGA account, SGA officers
were required to use the voucher
system, in accordance withthehud»
itor's rules, which applied to all
students.

Now, it seems that these Charge

accounts have been reropened, and
there is no requirement that there
be any money in the SGA account
before any purchase is made. Bud-
gets are destroyed by such acts
as this. Another point of fiscal fool—
ishneSS occurred when the house
presidents voted to increase hall
funds 65? per student over the re-
ccommcndation of the Finance Com—
mittee in order to place more money
under their direct control. There
seems to have been no increase in
hall activities this semester, des-
pite the increase. The money was
not needed in the halls, but it was
put there.

In its present form, I feel that
the SGA does not speak for the Stu-
dents of Grinnell and l no longer
want to have my name associated
with it, Hence, this letter is to be
considered as my resignation from
the Finance Committee, effective
immediately

Steven D. Stern

Eldridge: 0n
College Attrition

To the Editors:

1 would like to clear up a state
ment made in the December a edi-
tion of the sea. Ron Medvin im-
plies that the attrition rate at Grins
nell College is high because of seer
ial reasons. This is not true. Many
people leave Grinnell not because
they are dissatisfied with the social
life but for very valid academic and
personal reasons (Jim Tederman
study, Fall 1972). For instance, a
person interested in Egyptian his»
tory should not be at Grinnell Col-
lege. Or perhaps they just can’t
afford the $4050, it is true if you
lop out these people, the ones that
are dissatisfied, do leave mainly
because of social reasons. But let’s
set the record straight.

Reed Eldridge

It’s Finals Week Again!

by Jim Alt

Finals week is one of my favorite
times of the semester. After all,
it is almost time to quit banging
our heads against the wall.

A few things abouifinals weekboth-
er me, though. For instance, it is
nearly impossible to escape the
sound of typewriters. They keep
pounding, day and night, all over
campus. It gets like the drums in
the late movie W “They’re driving
me crazy!”

i think they bother me because l
have not yet written the papers that
everyone else is typing. I start
getting that tight feeling in my
throat, that suspicion that I am not
going to Get Done.

i used to operate on the belief
that no matter how bad it looks,
everything somehow always gets
done. That faith was the only thing
that kept me going through somebad
finals weeks.

Then my faith was shattered. I
discovered that everything does not
always get done, as a couple of
Incompletes proved. i no longer be-
lieve in the miraculous generation
of papers out of nothingness.

Now i have gone to the other exr
treme. I wonder how anything ever
gets done. You sit down with a pile
of books, a bunch of notes, and pos-
sibly some ideas ...and a paper hap-
pens, sometimes, Sometimesitdoes
not.

The worst part is that after you
have finished a piece of work you
always know exactly how bad it is
You know where you had to write
around a contradiction, and you
know the counter—arguments that you
ignored and will later see writtenin
red ink. Nothing ever feels com-
pleted; there is always something
more that should be said.

But with otherassignments closing
in and with increasing panic, you
patch things up as best you can and
declare the paper finished. By that
point, the only satisfaction from
writing a paper is getting it done.
I wonder, though, if I would ever
be pleased with a paper, regard-
less of how much time I had towrite

ADVERTISING nihilism. .
clncuLATioNMAnACEn. ..
seonTscnnon . eriylker
coLuMNiSTS ., Jim AILGYHI
Daflnul, incx rennin, Kellthxiuil, Scull mm,
suvc unnn, .vnna rcu

PNDTOCRAPHERS.

Ran Bummer, Ben

Eldrtﬂle, NanKy riauhir, an, unfair, uni
cos... run Gordon, cnlrkuusnil, lax
Mantle, and sparks. xcn Wilwkui’.

ARTIST , noun aursnln
TYPIST . Nlnlyoﬁwald
nCPonTEns . ,Mtkcnrudleok
Rurhules, thin: Carey Ami tassel. unnehc
Casey, pivlu Crow, new Eldrlﬂre. sin Gin",
cnit ennui. Ailnm kuus, Mulne any. nan
Mcﬂvln, Cult Mimi-y. Dave ulsniu, Lynne
ogiwa, binnu ROSWIK. Bruit srnnnocuncm,
mi Sinners. barn Susin,LyIiuVoeﬂls<h.erlha
wncxir, urn winntui, Terry Wolf

announauunK
Par Snlxhlﬂv

.innn beneath,

it. i suspect that deadlines are a
good thing; otherw'se i really might
not get anything fi shed.

Of course, part or the problem may
be that l operate on the ”manana
principle," as do most people i
know. Why do today what you can
put Off until tomorrow, right?

In fact, I think that lhave diSr
covered an equally importantcbrol-
lary to this principle: The volume
of work that is assigned will ex—
pand to fill all the available time.

This means that whether you are
taking twelve credits, or sixteen, or
twenty, you will always reachapoint
in the semester where you doubt
that the work can be finished.

When everybody starts feeling that
way, the campus develops a cancer
tive case of neurosis.,..even worse
than usual.

Part of the problem is that peer
ple quit sleeping. Then they start
walking into things, and falling down,
and crying a lot, and they find it dif-
ficult to speak coherently,

Conversations during finals week
are amazing. When theyoccuratali,
they tend to be between people who
are neither talking nor comprehend
ing very well. During a bad case
of Grinnell Finals, people revert
to grunting and groaning at one an-
other. We all get a little primitive
Although profs do better than some
of their students, they are not imr
mune to the effects of linl’ils. They,
too, become irritable, possibly be-
cause they must listen to a steady
stream of wasted students beg for
extensions and imcompletes.

Besides, there are all those pap-
ers that they promised to return but
have not yet started redding,...and
all those students remindingthem of
the fact. Could the manana prlnr
ciple be at work for profs, too?
i was encouraged the other day,
though, by a demonstration that peo-
ple really do learn things duringthe
hassled part Of the semester. A
freshman who had apparently ﬂoated
through the semester was experi—
encing the crunch of papers and
finals for the first time What he
had learned, and what he was dis—
coursing upon at great length, was
the proper label for this semester
rend occupational hazard, namely,
the feared and hated Academic Pros
ssure.

But given that his occupation is
“student," what other occupational
hazard could he expect? Perhaps
we should put up a sign saying,
“Warning The Grinhell Experience
may cause temporary insanity."

Or maybe it should just read,
”Warning: The Grinnell Experience
is temporary insanity.”

 

