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Page 2/The BattaliorvThursday, December 10, 1987
Opinion
The Battalion
(USPS 045 360)
Member of
Texas Press Association
Southwest Journalism Conference
The Battalion Editorial Board
Sue Krenek, Editor
Daniel A. LaBry, Managing Editor
Mark Nair, Opinion Page Editor
Amy Couvillon, City Editor
Robbyn L. Lister and Becky Weisenfels,
News Editors
Loyd Brumfield, Sports Editor
Sam B. Myers, Photo Editor
Editorial Policy
The Battalion is a non-profit, self-supporting newspaper oper
ated as a community service to Texas A&M and Bryan-College Sta
tion.
Opinions expressed in The Battalion are those of the editorial
board or the author, and do not necessarily represent the opinions
of Texas A&M administrators, faculty or the Board of Regents.
The Battalion also serves as a laboratory newspaper for students
in reporting, editing and photography classes within the Depart
ment of Journalism.
The Battalion is published Monday through Friday during
Texas A&M regular semesters, except for holiday and examination
periods.
Mail subscriptions are $17.44 per semester, $34.62 per school
year and $36.44 per full year. Advertising rates furnished on re
quest.
Our address: The Battalion, 216 Reed McDonald, Texas A&M
University, College Station, TX 77843-4 111.
Second class postage paid at College Station, TX 77843.
POSTMASTER: Send address changes to The Battalion, 216
Reed McDonald, Texas A&M University, College Station TX
77843-4111.
Movin' out
Once again, the nine-month residence hall contract is caus
ing problems — this time because of the Interim Housing Pro
gram.
On-campus students can pay to be housed in a Keathley Hall
room over the Christmas holidays. Keathley residents whose
rooms will be used to house these students must either vacate
their rooms or entrust their belongings to the interim resident.
In the past, students who needed interim housing used
rooms left vacant by students moving off campus for the spring
semester. Under the University’s nine-month contract, however,
not enough rooms have been left vacant — hence the need for
current residents to make way for Christmas occupants.
The contracts Keathley residents signed made no mention
of the possibility the rooms might have to be vacated over
Christmas, and some residents have said they would have
switched dorms had they known of the possibility. University of
ficials say no mention is needed because students don’t really
pay for their dorm rooms during the month they’re gone and
are allowed to leave their belongings there only as a courtesy.
Worse than the contractual omission is the fact that students
will get little notice that their rooms will be used. Students have
until Monday to sign up for interim housing, meaning Keathley
residents may be notified Monday that they have to move out
before the dorms close Tuesday.
Officials expect students to be responsible enough to commit
in March to living in a dorm until the following May — 14
months later — but apparently feel free to evict students on one
day’s notice. In doing this, A&M officials act less responsibly
than the students they have forced into nine-month contracts —
and end up looking like nothing but hypocrites.
— The Battalion Editorial Board
A responsible budget
The members of
the Student Sen
ate Finance Com
mittee feel com
pelled to respond
to the allegations
of fiscal irrespon
sibility expressed
in a recent Battalion editorial. The bud
get requests for next year totaled more
than $6.2 million, and we had only
about $5 million income to be allocated.
Had we funded the entire $6.2 million,
the Student Service Fee would need to
be increased to $83 per semester for
next year. Therefore, about $1.2 million
had to be cut from budget requests.
Note that actual /und/ng increased 2.35
percent. This will result in a $2 increase
in next year’s fee.
The Battalion Editorial Board stated
that our recommendation would “force”
the Health Center to cut its “emergency
after-hours service.” Another article
said we recommended the “elimination
of all-night, inpatient care” and that
“health care services from midnight to 8
a.m. be discontinued.” All these
statements are incorrect. We never con
sidered eliminating all-night, inpatient
care or after-hours emergency service.
These services are not affected by our
recommendation. The Health Center
requested more than $300,000 for a
contract to keep a physician on location
at all hours. We eliminated the on-site
requirement from midnight to 8 a.m.
and reduced the contract amount by
$120,00. Two nurses will remain on
duty at all hours, and we recommended
that several physicians be on call to ad
mit emergencies. We also strongly rec
ommended that the Health Center and
the Student Counseling Service cooper
ate in the matter of after-hours service.
The Battalion also implied that health
services received a lower priority than
the MSC. The editors claim that we des
ignated the MSC programs to be “more
‘vital’ than health care.” In fact, the
Health Center received a 37% increase
in funding! The Health Center has now
surpassed the MSC as the largest single
recipient of Student Service Fees. This
is the first time in at least five years that
the MSC has not received the greatest
allocation of fees. The Health Center
received the largest dollar increase
($384,139) and percent increase (37
percent) of any of the funded pro
grams. In fact, the Health Center re
ceived more than 50 percent of the total
recommended increases in funding
over last year. Therefore, our priority
was clearly and overwhelmingly on
health services.
The recommendations concerning
the Multicultural Services Center were
also criticized by The Battalion. The
Battalion editors claim that we “judged
the Multicultural Services Center not on
its merits but on its potential as a
weapon in a political power game.” Ac
tually, we never considered this to be a
political issue. We were charged with
the responsibility of recommending fee
allocations in the best interests of the
student body. The Multicultural Serv
ices Center was, from conception to allo
cation of funding, entirely an adminis
trative enterprise. No students were
consulted or even notified of these pro
ceedings. The Finance Committee
stated dissatisfaction with these actions
in our cover letter that accompanied the
bill. There was no “smoke screen” for
our “real objection” as The Battalion ed
itors claimed. They also asserted that we
are “foisting the issues onto the adminis
tration” by not funding the multicultu
ral program. On the contrary, it was the
administration who foisted the program
on the student body without due proc
ess or consultation. We are not “cutting”
the funding of this program; we de
cided not to fund a program that has
never been funded by us.
Nevertheless, the manner in which
the program was created was not' used
as a justification for our recommenda
tion concerning the Multicultural Serv
ices Center. Although the Drug Preven
tion and Education Program was
established in a similar manner, we rec
ommended funding of the program’s
entire budget needs. The reasons for
funding this program and not the other
are clear: The drug program is a benefi
cial service that is not duplicated else
where in the University; the multicultu
ral program does not meet this criteria.
We did not state that the multicultural
program was of no benefit to the stu
dent body. However, these benefits are
already provided by several organiza
tions that receive Student Service Fee
funding.
The program also would help the ad
ministration meet its minority recruit
ment goals, most of which are mandated
by the government. We believe it is the
responsibility of the administration to
fund these benefits.
We hope that these explanations will
alleviate some of the concerns about the
recommended allocation of Student
Service Fees.
Doug Baumann, a senior, is chairman
of the Student Government Finance
Committee.
Doug
Baumann
Guest Columnist
Li
• perc
Student life can be difficult 1
when you’re Unpronounceable i,
The other day,
my history profes
sor was passing
back our graded
take-home tests,
and as I waited for
him to call my
name, I knew he
would say it
wrong. He did.
Everybody says
my last name
wrong.
It’s not easy going through life with
an unpronounceable last name. It gets
to be a little annoying when everyone
from professors to phone solicitors com
pletely butchers the name you’ve had
since birth.
My family is from Baton Rouge, so
I’m an honest-to-goodness Cajun who
just happened to grow up in Texas. Peo
ple in Louisiana can pronounce “Couvil
lon” (for you non-coonasses out there,
it’s Coo-Vee-On) without making me
cringe, but with most Texans, it will
come up sounding closer to “Co-Vile-
Un” or, God forbid, “Cow Villain.” I
may be unpronounceable, but I’ve
never stolen any livestock.
But I’ve learned to deal with it. Since
I came to A&M more than three years
ago, I’ve developed some defensive tac
tics that can prevent the mispronuncia
tion. When my professors call roll on
the first day of class, I’m listening, wait
ing, as soon a§ they enter the C’s.
“Caballero. Chaddick. Clark,” the
professor reads. Then there is a con
fused pause, a squint. The professor’s
Amy
Couvillon
brow wrinkles, and his mouth opens
again. That’s my cue.
I raise my hand and ask, “Could that
possibly be Couvillon?" — usually much
to the professor’s and my relief. An
other merciless mutilation of my family
name has been averted.
When I started working at The Bat
talion during my junior year, I found
that I was not alone in my Unpronoun
ceable Name affliction. One of the re
porters I worked with had the honor to
be known as Olivier Uyttebrouck. (It
doesn’t look like it’s spelled right, but it
is. I couldn’t spell it, but I asked the girl
who was night news editor when Olivier
worked here and had to type in his
nightmarish byline whenever he forgot
to put it in his stories — which appar
ently was quite often.) On many occa
sions Olivier and I sat at adjacent desks,
spelling our names for sources over the
phone — again and again and again.
“U-y-t-t . . .” Olivier would be say
ing over one phone, while on the next
phone, I was repeating for the thou
sandth time, “c-o-u, v-as-in-Victor, i-1-1-
o-n. Did you get that?”
By the time I was promoted from
staff writer to assistant city editor, Oliv
ier had graduated. So, to continue the
Re porter-With-The-Unpronouncable—
Name tradition, I hired Lee Schex-
naider. We called him “Lee the Unpro
nounceable” for months. To this day, I
still can’t spell his name, although I fi
nally learned to say it.
Our city editor that semester was Jens
Koepke. He’s German, and his name is
pronounced “Yenz Kepkey,” but people
— Mail Call -
never seemed to get it right. Whenever
people phoned the Batt office and
asked for a “Jeans Cupcake,” I knew
who to call.
Sondra Pickard, our recently-de
parted editor, has a name that seems
anyone could pronounce. But for some
reason, people who send press releases
to The Battalion can’t seem to spell Son-
dra’s name. Mail came in addressed to
Sandra Pickard, Sandra Packard
Sandra Tickard, and one day, — to the
glee and amusement of everyone in the
newsroom — we got a letter addressed
to Saundra Pritchard. Sondra loved it.
She kept a running tally of the errors,
displaying the address labels on
door of the editor’s office.
It just gets worse. At Ease, our weekh
magazine, has had a proud legacy
Unpronouncable staffers, including Ka
ren Kroesche, Nancy Neukirchner
Randy Marquardt. A few weeks ago, Lee
the Unpronounceable — perhapi
pulled by this sheer concentration of fe!
low Unpronounceables — left city desk
to work on At Ease next semester along
with the magazine’s new editor, Lydii
Berzsenyi.
Lee’s defection left city desk bereft o(
an Unpronouncable — but not for long
Last week, I hired a staff writer with the
formidable name of Todd Riemensch
neider. Now, that’s a name. If it were
any longer, we’d have to hyphenate his
byline.
The tradition continues.
Amy Couvillon is a senior journalist
major, city editor and columnist for
The Battalion.
Al
not i
carry:
ivs
iabili
court
Th
jectec
ance
shift
prem
societ
Th
liabili
comp
had
awar<
Give me a light
EDITOR:
If Texas A&M University can afford to build a new
parking garage and a new Aerospace building, why can’t it
provide adequate lighting on campus at night? A number
of lights which already exist on campus burn out. Many
have since the beginning of the semester.
The lighting on the Military Walk particularly con
cerns me. One of the pylon lights by Sbisa has been decapi
tated, and no efforts have been taken to repair it other
than some duct tape. Also, the lights which are supposed
to light the way on the Military Walk are almost nonexis
tent. The cost to replace the lights certainly doesn’t exceed
the cost of a new Aerospace building or parking garage.
The University can certainly reserve funds to replace the
damaged lights.
Lighting on campus is a student service, and all stu
dents pay student service fees. So, why aren’t some of these
fees used to fix the lighting? The lack of lighting not only
causes a safety hazard to students walking on campus at
night but also detracts from the beauty of Texas A&M
University. Therefore, efforts should be taken to eliminate
this hazard and provide light for students at night. -J
Mike Petix ’91
Health Center: true or false
EDITOR:
Now that finals are here, it’s time to take one more test:
one question - 100 points.
True or False: The A.P. Beutel Health Center should
be a service for the students’ general health and overall
welfare (open 24 hours a day).
If you answered “true” — welcome to the general pop
ulation of Texas A&M University.
If you answered “false” — you must be a member of
our oligarchical Student Senate.
Karin Richeson ‘90
Letters to the editor should not exceed 300 words in length. The editorial staff re
serves the right to edit letters for style and length, but will make every effort to
maintain the author’s intent. Each letter must be signed and must include, the clas
sification, address and telephone number of the writer.
BLOOM COUNTY
by BerKe Breathed
... AM ENVIRONMeNTAUST
NATURE-HEAP ?
A FEMINIST WIMP ?
A VeOETAFIAN RINKO ?
WHO KNOWS WHAT
y ELSE/