Image provided by: Texas A&M University
About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Jan. 24, 1995)
Tuesday • January 24, 1995 Opinion - is The Battalion • Page 11 Regents Reform Bill may bring A&M hope, change J ust when you thought this school’s problems were out of control, along comes some hope. n a piece of legislation in troduced recently by State Representative Steve Og den of Bryan, large universi ties in Texas, such as ours and the University of Texas, may face stricter rules. The act, labeled “Regents Reform Bill”, sets down a number of additions to the Texas Educa tion Code regarding Boards of Regents of acade mic institutions. These additions, no doubt, stem from the recent troubles brought upon A&M be cause of wrongdoings by a former regent and a vice president. To be specific, the bill, officially House Bill 420, limits the annual expenditures of a govern ing board and denies the reimbursement of ex penditures incurred by regents in performing their own personal duties. It denies the naming of buildings or facilities on a campus after a current regent. A regent must have ceased to be a member for more than four years be fore a building can be named for him or her. The “Regent Reform Bill” prohibits members of the board or their immediate family or friends from being employed by the university. Similar ly, the university cannot contract busi ness with family or friends of the regents. The bill also forbids the consumption of alcoholic beverages during meetings and in the offices of the governing board. The only exception is during offi cial social functions of the board; even then the bill requires that any alcoholic beverages other than beer and wine must be sold at a cash bar or by a private li censed operator. Furthermore, persons appointed can only serve one six-year term and only three years as chairman. Finally, the reform allows for grounds for re moval of regents by the governor. One section that may especially affect students calls for regents to hold a public hearing before in creasing tuition rates and other fees. Now we will not only be notified of the continually increasing tuition and fees, but we may actually have the op portunity to prevent those increases. I know I’ve often wondered why fees increase every year yet I never see any improvements. In a related issue, the bill calls for boards to study its academic system and submit a report to the state legislature for reorganization or restruc turing of the institutions so as to maximize the use of state monies. This could include absorption or consolidation of other public colleges that Eire not part of the A&M system. This may prove the most beneficial of all the re forms. If the university can find ways to maxi mize the state’s allocated money, then we may one day see a decrease in tuition and fees. It’s a shame that the state legislature has to set down rules such as these to deter appointed and elected officials of our university from steal ing from taxpayers or otherwise breaking the law, especially in an institution such as Texas A&M whose high values teach us not to lie, cheat or steal. Or is it only students who are subject to this Aggie Code of Honor? Don’t get me wrong, there are many great faculty members, administrators and regents of this university, but an ever-grow ing number of bad apples are hurting this uni versity, as the recent state audit will testify. This misuse of power and mismanagement of funds by administrative officials and faculty may have already cost us. When the state legis lature starts allocating funds for state colleges beginning this month, we may see a signi ficant decrease. If nothing else, maybe H.B. 420 will prevent the complacency and arrogance that often lead people who have been in high positions for an extended amount of time to abuse their power or create small bureaucracies within their departments. As for those of us students, former stu dents, faculty, administrators and regents who do give a damn about Texas A&M and its future, we can no longer tolerate those who bring us down. I urge all of you to support this bill. Call your state legislator or Rep. Ogden himself. Furthermore, I urge that we report any other wrongdoings we may know of, on or off campus, that can adversely affect our university. We must send a message to the legislature and others that Aggies will not allow their university to be corrupted by two-percenters or those with malicious personal interests. Zach Hall is a sophomore mechanical engineering major As for those of us students, former stu dents, faculty, administrators and regents who do give a damn about Texas A&M and its future, we can no longer tolerate those who bring us down. The Battalion Established in 1893 Editorials appearing in The Battalion reflect the views of the editorial board. They do not necessarily reflect the opinions of other Battalion staff members, the Texas A&M student body, regents, administration, faculty or staff. Columns, guest columns, cartoons and letters express the opinions of the authors. Contact the opinion editor for information on submitting guest columns. EDITORIAL BOARD Mark Smith Editor in chief Jay Robbins Heather Winch Senior Managing Managing editor editor far Business Sterling Hayman Opinion editor Erin Hill Asst, opinion editor Computer Control Texas A&hA University should not seek to censor any information on the Internet. Within the next five years, all rooms in on-campus residence halls may have quick access to the Inter net, thanks to ethemet connections. However, the November decision of Carnegie Mellon University to eliminate certain sex-related news- groups from its computer system sets a dangerous precedent. If other schools follow this exam ple, censorship of other subjects, per haps even in other media, may not be very far behind. There are several dangers that are ap parent in Carnegie Mellon’s decision. As Assistant Gen eral Counsel Melis sa Ricard pointed out, the Internet is so new that there is no precedent to fol low in regards to what consti tutes censorship on that electronic medi um. Second, if guidelines regarding what can and cannot be posted on the Internet are established, who will set them up? Who truly has the right to say what should and should not be allowed on the Internet? Finally, how would such guide lines be enacted? To keep “forbidden knowledge” from the Internet, the en tire Internet would have to be monitored. Someone would have access to everything that goes on across the different discussion groups. How long before private communi cation that uses the Internet, such as e-mail or conversations on the IRC, would be monitored? If these are monitored, where would it stop? Would fax messages be monitored? Per haps cellular phone calls would be next. Although schools do have the right to limit access to their systems and certain activities that might take place across the Internet, they do not have the right to deter mine what materi als should and should not be made available. The Random House Dictionary defines a university as “an institu tion of learning of the high est level.” Learning can only take place in an environment where one is free to learn and question, where ideas can be debated. The function of this university is to encourage learning and new ideas, not stifle them. Mail System schools not stealing A&M traditions I would like to respond to the article regarding sister schools bearing the A&M name by Zachary Hall. I will con cede that I too disagree with all the re cent name changes at the smaller uni versities and hold the Aggie traditions very near to my heart. However, as a recent transfer from Texas A&M University — Kingsville and a former resident of Corpus Christi, I disagree with much of the content of your article. Our A&M traditions are not in dan ger. As you already pointed out, Texas A&I alumni opposed the name change just as if not more vehemently as the A&M Association of Former Students. Thus, A&M — Kingsville sought to pre serve many of their own traditions, such as the blue and gold school colors MSC Political Forum caters to moderates and the javelina mascot. In fact, the only change I noticed in the “new” uni versity was a steep increase in fees. I have no knowledge of South Texans referring to themselves as Aggies not do I believe people have difficulty distin guishing us from our sister schools. Furthermore, the time-honored tradi tion of the Aggie ring will prevail. Although similar in design, the al most religious significance of our Aggie ring cannot be matched. As a fellow Aggie, I mean you no harm. I realize that you are only proud to be a part of the Aggie spirit. Well, friend, I’m proud too. I’m proud to finally be attending Texas A&M University, proud of who I am ... proud of where I come from. In the future, I ask that you use more of the Aggie respect, that kindness that seems to exude from all students here. A&M — Kingsville is not trying to dis honor this school. They are simply making an effort to improve themselves and easing the transition by adding “Texas A&M” to their name. Perhaps we both, should take a little more pride in that rather than criticism. Amy Elizabeth Crockroft Class of’97 In Friday’s column, “We moderates don’t mind straddling fences,” Erin Hill suggested that there should be a student organization for Aggies who want to hear both sides of political issues. Well, there ' is, and it has been an Aggie tradition since 1966 — the Memorial Student Cen ter Political Forum Committee, and for 28 years we have provided Texas A&M University with non-partisan programs designed to keep Aggies informed on cur- * rent political issues. In recent years. Political Forum has brought Aggieland speakers like Presi dent and Mrs. George Bush, Senate can didate Richard Fisher, Governors George W. Bush and Ann Richards, and State Comptroller John Sharp. We’re com pletely student-run, so our members get hands-on experience in dealing with the political world. We’re a pretty diverse bunch, but we tend to get along very well because we’re all in Political Forum for the same reason: we believe that both sides of the political spectrum deserve to be heard and we believe that Aggies de serve to hear both sides of the issues. Chris Williams Class of ’96 Regulation of Internet should not be allowed Questionable material, information not easily found T here are many different types of information on the Internet, and be cause of this, it has endless uses. Users can find just about anything on the Inter net if they are resourceful. Files containing pornography and even ones detailing the assembly of homemade bombs and other terrorist tools can be found on this popular lane of the information super-highway. It is the latter type of files that have made politicians like A1 Gore want to censor the Internet by regulat ing its content. Currently Texas A&M does not reg ulate what stTudents can access on the Internet. But according to Interim Provost Charles Lee, A&M has ap pointed a fact-finding team to research whether or not it would be feasible to regulate the Internet. Recently, colleges such as Carnegie Mellon have denied its students access to newsgroups that contain sexual ma terial through the university’s com puter network. It is my hope that Texas A&M would never deal a similar fate to its students, be cause regulation of the Internet — in any form — is a re gressive move. Last semester the Internet took a bad rap because it contained pictures of a nude woman posing around the Texas A&M campus. The pictures were brought to the forefront when The Battalion printed one of these photographs. The photographs were contained in a newsgroup on the Inter net that A&M computing services makes available to students. Some students were concerned that The Battalion printed the photo, and some criticized the University for allow ing these pictures and others like them to be available through the school’s comput ing network. Much of the flak about censoring the Internet revolves around the availability of offensive pictures. The truth is that one cannot stumble upon an offensive picture without trying, but rather must purposely perform many steps to view it. Pictures are binary files — made up of numbers and other characters that ap pear as rubbish on the screen, when opened incorrectly. A person must save the picture to their University account, download it to their computer and then view it with a special program that converts the binary code to an image on their computer screen. The point is that pornographic pic tures on the Internet usually do not of fend its users because almost all users who are viewing the pictures are aware of their content and are pur posely viewing them. There are things on the Intemet which may not seem to have any re deeming value whatsoever. But who should have the power to define what is .allowed and what is not? Certainly not the government, and definitely not Texas A&M. If such a restriction was imposed, think of all the depth the Internet would lose. For example, if a restriction was im posed allowing only educational uses for the Internet, which some politi cians have proposed, I would have never been able to download that Beastie Boys screen saver, or that sound clip of “Stairway to Heaven” playing backward, oh, or that picture of Helen Hunt. These are a few of the many uses I have had for the Internet that would probably be lost. While there are those who have the power to censor what is available to students on the Internet at Texas A&M, such as the president of the University and the CIS themselves, they should realize these would be very unpopular decisions, and would most likely end up in lawsuits against the University. A much simpler solution to the prob lem is not regulation of the Intemet, but one on a more personal level. Regarding offensive pictures — if you know you may be offended, don’t go downloading them. And regarding the files containing the assembly of homemade weapons and such — theoretically, when stu dents get their computer accounts they must agree to not use their account in any malicious way. We must be careful to recognize the privilege the Texas A&M Administra tion and CIS department have be stowed upon us. They are treating us like adults capa ble of making our own decisions. We should respect that. Two big events could change the way the Intemet is operated. In the future. Congress could pass laws dealing specifi cally with the Intemet. Recently, the government sold a large part of the Intemet to the private sector. This could mean more regulation. We should recognize the Intemet as a frontier, but one that needs little taming. It would be unfortunate if in the fu ture we had to look back on these days as the glory days of the Intemet — back when freedom of speech still applied. Kyle Littlefield is a senior journalism major
