Page 2/The Battalion/Wednesday, August 5 1987
Opinion
Students should respect kindness
There’s a lot of
talk in this town
about lending a
helping hand to a
fellow Ag. We are, as
Aggies, supposedly
honorable, caring,
responsible students
and peers. Maybe we
just need to be
reminded
occasionally what
being responsible
and caring means in
I’m a firm believer in responsibility. Every
day of our lives we must take responsibility
for our actions. It is part of being a college
student and an adult.
friends were all studying for their own tests.
It’s the same.
We take responsibility for paying our bills,
for going to class, for studying. When it
comes to being kind to other people we
sometimes forget the responsibility we take
in the other areas of our lives.
DA
Jensen
our everyday lives. At A&M the good guy
should not have to beware.
After I finished a statistics test Thursday,
the prof asked me if I would let a guy who
had not brought his calculator to the test
borrow mine. I thought it would be a good
opportunity to help out a fellow classmate so
I agreed. I asked the guy to return my
calculator the next morning in class. He
didn’t come to class again until Tuesday.
I did eventually get my calculator
returned after the guy got back into town
from the weekend, but the whole experience
left me wondering about how responsibly
Ags act with each other.
No one is perfect. It’s easy to forget a
calculator on the day of a test. It’s nice that
classmates are willing to loan you a scantron
or a pencil when you need one. It’s
responsible action that leads that borrower
to act graciously when accepting an
extended kindness. The helping hand
should not be taken for granted or abused.
I loaned this guy my calculator because he
was in a bind. I did not expect undying
gratitude. I only expected to get my
calculator back the next morning so I could
do some mundane things, like my
homework.
When someone lends a helping hand,
they do it because they know they would
want help if the roles were reversed. They
feel good about helping another person. It
gives them a feeling of personal satisfaction.
That satisfaction quickly turns to a feeling of
being a fool when their kindness is abused.
This is the reason people are reluctant to
reach out the helping hand,
I know I will hesitate to loan my
belongings to strangers in the future, even if
they are fellow Aggies.
It’s easy to pass this matter off lightly until
you are the one that needs a hand and no
one offers help.
The calculator seems like a petty thing to
make waves over since calculators are so
plentiful. I could have borrowed one from a
friend for four days, even though my
I think we all need to be a little more
conscious of the response we offer when
someone helps us out. If we continuously
abuse a kind gesture, then the next time we
need one it may not be forthcoming. It’s
time to act responsibly when we accept help
from another person.
D. A. Jensen is a junior journalism major
and a columnist for The Battalion.
MAfcGUUK
MOWN Ft*T
On the fly with Delta Air Lines
Delta Air Lines
has appointed a
special committee to
investigate all the
problems it’s been
having lately with
things like near mid
air collisions and
landing at wrong
airports.
I’ve been a loyal
Delta patron for
many years, and
quite frankly, I
Lewis
Grizzard
believe Delta has been getting a raw deal in
the press.
Because of this, I decided to launch my
own investigation of Delta’s recent
misfortunes. I called one of my many
sources with the airline and he explained
what really happened with the celebrated
incidents of the past few weeks.
I promised not to use the source’s name if
he would be completely frank with me, an
old journalistic tool that is often necessary to
use when getting at the truth, or getting at
somebody.
I asked about the fact a Delta pilot landed
in Frankfort, Ky., when he was supposed to
land at Lexington.
“Picky, picky, picky,” began my source.
“At least we got the right state. Plus, it was
night and the crew couldn’t look out the
window and find the K-Mart where they’re
supposed to hang a right when they are
landing in Lexington.”
That explained that, so I asked about the
near collision over Newfoundland that was
caused when a Delta jet went 60 miles off
course into the airspace of a Continental
airliner.
“I have talked to the pilots, and they said
they were trying to dodge Halley’s Comet,”
my source explained.
I was somewhat skeptical of this due to the
fact that Halley’s Comet only comes around
about once in every lifetime. My source
would not budge, however.
“In the immortal words of Ollie North,
‘It’s our story, and we’re sticking to it,’ ” he
said.
Then I wanted to know what happened
when a Delta pilot cut off the engine during
takeoff from San Diego and nearly dumped
the plane into the Pacific Ocean.
“The pilot is a real cut-up, and he was just
having a little fun with the passengers,” my
source continued.
“At least he doesn’t put a lampshade on
his head while flying anymore. And what’s
the big deal here? The seat cushions could
have been used as flotation, and everybody
could have paddled back to shore if he
hadn’t got the engines to start up again.”
A Delta jet also landed on the wrong
runway at the Boston airport.
“Runways all look alike,” my source said.
“They’re long and narrow with a bunch of
numbers on them. What, you’ve never
turned up a one-way street before?”
There was one more thing I wanted to
ask, and that was about the Deltajet that
took off without clearance.
“We didn’t take off without clearance,”
my source said. “We took off without
Clarence. Clarence Elrod, the navigator,
who got lost on the way to the airport.”
Completely satisfied that all the incidents
were not anything to be concerned about, I
thanked my source for his time and honesty,
and I think I can say without hesitation that
Delta still gets you there.
With or without Clarence.
Copyright 1987, Cowles Syndicate
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Mail Call
U.S. benefits from foreign students
EDITOR:
Frank Fay questioned whether it was appropriate for Texas A®
to have foreign students who pay the same as out-of-state studentsaji
then take their knowledge back to their countries to compete with us
This question lias been asked by others and deserves an answer.
The Texas Legislature has discussed this many times over the
years and has changed the fee structure from free tuition for
Internationals to the present $120 per credit hour. Two years agoth
Coordinating Board of the University 8c College system in Texas
figured the total cost of educating a student to be $ 120 per credit
hour. The Legislature assigned that cost to all non-Texans — our tax
payers are no longer subsidizing non-Texans at TAMU. The
Internationals also pay an additional $12 fee per semester for the
extra services they need.
Foreign students were first invited here to enhance the education
of Texans. We can learn as much from them as they can from us.Tht
U.S. government hopes they will have such a fruitful experience at
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our universities, that they will return with a positive attitude toward cadon, be
democracy. The fact remains that for this glimpse of democracy in
action and the opportunity to earn an education in the United States,
foreign students pay their own way. In other countries this isn’t alwat
so. The Soviet Union, for instance, invites foreign students tostudyii
their country at no cost: no tuition or room and board to pay. Agreai
many Central Americans, who could not otherwise afford university
educations, take advantage of this free program.
Our hope is to foster better understanding between other nations
and ourselves and to bring more harmony to the world. So, the issue
Mr. Fay might want to consider is not merely the cost of an education
of Internationals (which they pay for), but the global impact of
encouraging foreigners to study in the United States.
Tina Watkins
International Student Adviser
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EDITOR:
This is in response to Frank Fay’s letter in Thursday’s Battalion
protesting the fact that foreign students’ tuition is the same as foroui
of-state U.S. citizens.
In answer to your question, Mr. Fay, yes, this is what it takes to
become a world-class university. A&M encourages the foreign
students to come here, and with good reason. Do you realize thatif
tuition were raised for foreign students, many of them wouldn’tbe
able to attend A&M? If your answer to this is “so what,” then go find;
foreign student. Take some time to talk to him or her, and maybe
you’ll realize what a privilege most of these people consider it to be
here. In their own countries, they can’t get A&M’s quality of educatr
— or any education for that matter. Many would be fighting in civil
wars or bound by political systems which don’t allow the kind of fra
educational system that Artierica offers. And while you talk to this
person, take a little time to find out about them, their country, their
customs and beliefs. Not only will that larger understanding of the
world picture benefit you personally, but in a professional sense as
well. The woi Id is growing increasingly more interdependent: four
out of five new U.S. jobs are created as a direct result of foreign trade
and approximately one-third of U.S. corporate profits come from
international activities. The better you understand other peoplesa
cultures, the better equipped you will be for the future.
A world-class university is (if it can be defined) one that recognize
these facts and works to bring people from different countries
together for mutual benefit. It should not be one that xenophobicalh
discourages foreign students from enrolling.
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Mary Beth Butler
graduate student
Reagan presidency limping along
EDITOR:
With Irangate closing in and Iran screaming at the United States,
President Reagan is joking about his nose operation.
It is amazing how much can be done by an administration to diver
attention from its deeply-rooted problems.
The tale of Irangate is so sordid that it will take many scholars ant
much time to figure out this complex problem in our executive powei
Ronald Reagan recently spoke on taxes. The lame duck presideni
is running around the country looking busy and reading speeches
written by someone else.
Occasionally, he will read a joke that pertains to nothing that is
relevant, namely his nose. He does not even read these correctly.
CUT! Bring in the fall president. The only action that can saveth
Reagan today is a stunt president.
Oh, how Reagan wishes he could call in a double and forget his
mistakes. Well, not exactly forget—just not recall.
Richard Storm ’87
David Driskell ’87
Letters to the editor should not exceed 300 words in length. The editorial staff reserves the
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letter must be signed and must include the classification, address and telephone number of tht
writer.
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Rodney Rather, City Editor
John Jarvis, Robbyn L. Lister, News Editors
Homer Jacobs, Sports Editor
Tracy Staton, Photo Editor
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