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RADIO WAVES
A brief history of local radio stations KANM
and KEOS.
Aggielife, Page 3
RISING TO THE OCCASION
Preston: Too often Christianity and Resurrection Week
do not practice what they preach.
Opinion, Page 11
AND THE BEAT GOES ON.
The Aggie baseball team beats
SWTSU 5-0 for its 1 Oth straight win
Sports, Page 7
/ol. 101, No. 130 (12 pages)
lillt
“Serving Texas AdrMsince 1893
.
Wednesday • April 12, 1995
niversity Plan strives for equality
The Access and Equi-
y 2000 Plan's goal is
to increase the number
of minority staff and
acuity members.
eeing a:
hat tb
i advise
e becativ
change
By Tracy Smith
[he Battalion
Texas A&M University is
triving toward a more diverse
workplace by focusing on ways
ents cal o increase the number of minor-
ut a vaiwy and women faculty members.
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Part 3 of 3
The University’s Access and
quity 2000 Plan’s goal is to
Continually increase the num
ber of African-American and
dispanic faculty, administra
tors and professional staff to a
number more equal to their
proportional representation in
the population.
The Plan began in Septem
ber 1994 and is a continuance
of the Texas Plan, which was
designed to end segregation of
African-Americans and un
der-representation of His-
panics in Texas schools.
The Plan will continue
through August 2000.
The Plan reports that
in the fall of 1994, 21 posi
tions out of the 363 execu
tive, administrative and
managerial (EAM) jobs
were held by minorities, 136
positions out of 1,482 profes
sional positions were held by
minorities and 89 positions out
of 1,730 faculty positions were
held by minorities.
The Access and Equity 2000
Plan’s goal is to increase these
numbers to 63 EAM positions,
275 professional positions and
130 faculty positions held by
minorities by the year 2000.
These goals were determined
using crite
ria from
the
1990
nation
al census
data for African-
Americans and the State of
Texas data for Hispanics.
The Plan strives to increase
the total number of women
holding faculty, professional
staff and EAM positions by in
creasing the number from 1,001
women holding these positions
in September 1994 to 1,250
women by 2,000. The goals for
women were assessed using
both national and state data.
Paul Catucci, retirement ser
vices manager for the Depart
ment of Human Resources and
Access and Equity 2000 com
mittee member, said the plan
ning and implementation for
Access and Equity 2000 looks
at what the University can do
and current programs that can
help the Plan’s goals.
“We first looked at what we
currently have on the campus
right now,” he said. “Then we
looked at what we could do.”
See Plan, Page 6
RHA objects to funding Corps
scholarships with rent money
□ Two scholarships
that benefit the Corps
of Cadets cost an aver
age of $30 per on-cam
pus resident a year.
By Wes Swift
The Battalion
The Corps of Cadets and on-
campus residents are at odds
over a recent Residence Hall As
sociation bill urging that hall
rents not be used to fund two
Corps scholarship programs.
See Editorial, Page 17
The RHA bill, passed March
30 through emergency legisla
tion, condemned the use of resi
dence hall rents to pay for the
Corps Room Scholarship Pro
gram and the Corps Leadership
Training and Adviser Program.
The bill recommended that
the Corps find others sources of
funding.
The bill stated that the two
programs cost on-campus resi
dents $337,972 every year, at an
average cost of $30 per student.
The Corps Room Scholarship
Program waives housing fees for
up to 100 freshmen with ROTC
scholarships. The Corps Leader
ship Training and Adviser Pro
gram funds the hiring of five
tactical advisers in the Corps
administration.
Matt Segrest, Corps Com
mander, said the two programs
contribute greatly to the Corps.
“The programs are very im
portant,” Segrest said. “They
add a lot to the experience of the
See Scholarships, Page 6
Boenig prioritizes platform goals
Student body presi-
ilent-elect says he will
work to represent the
students' needs.
By Kasie Byers
The Battalion
Although his role has
ihanged from speaker of the
^Student Senate to student body
president, Toby Boenig said the
one thing that won’t change is
ds push to make sure his con
stituency is heard.
“If there is one thing I have
earned from Student Senate,
it’s how to relate to my con
stituents better,” Boenig said.
“I plan to continue this commu
nication and work to improve it
Nick Rodnicki/THE Battalion
Toby Boenig is the next Stu
dent Body President.
even more.
“My office door will be open
all the time and I want every
one to feel free to come by any
time and speak with me about
concerns.”
Out of his 11-point platform,
Boenig said he thinks three
points are the most important:
financial aid, campus safety,
and cultural respect.
To improve financial aid,
Boenig said he will actively oppose
financial aid cuts in both the fed
eral and state legislatures.
“I plan on making sure that
the student viewpoint is voiced
in both the Texas legislature
and federal legislature about
stopping these cuts,” he said.
“One idea I have is initiating a
national letter writing cam
paign.
“Students could obtain form
letters about opposition of fi
nancial aid cuts to send to their
representatives. Our represen
tatives may not read them all,
but they won’t be able to ignore
the numbers.”
Boenig said he wants to im
prove campus safety by increasing
the number of emergency phones,
the number of self-defense courses
in the kinesiology department and
the number of University police
on campus at night. He also
wants to ensure that lighting is
improved on campus.
“I think it’s important that
the administration hears the
students’ viewpoints on the
safety of its campus,” he said.
“Every year I’ve been here, I’ve
heard of more and more prob
lems as far as campus safety is
concerned.
“I feel these ideas won’t be
hard to implement since the ad
ministration recognizes that
these problems exist.”
Boenig said the most important
step in increasing cultural respect
is for leaders of different student
groups to gather and open the
lines of communication.
“Before we can even begin to
talk of solutions about our cam
pus’ racial tensions, we must be
able to communicate calmly, in
telligently and rationally,” he
said. “It’s important for all of
us to try to understand others’
problems.
“I know I can never fully
know what minority students go
through, but it is my responsi
bility to try to understand what
they are going through.”
Boenig said he will try to
continue Student Body Presi
dent Brooke Leslie’s platform
achievements in order to make
a smooth transition between the
administrations.
“I think the transition will go
pretty smoothly,” he said, “con
sidering how closely Brooke and
I have worked this past year
and because we are close
friends.
“I plan on sitting down with
her platform and evaluating her
achievements. I hope I can car
ry these accomplishments over
and even improve on them.”
Boenig said that although he
hasn’t moved into his office yet,
he has already started working
on his platform goals.
“I want all of these to be accom
plished by the time my term is
up,” he said. “When I leave this of
fice I hope the students will say,
‘Toby Boenig was someone who
was always there for the students
and did everything possible for
this University.’
“That’s why I’ll work 60
hours a week to to get the job
done and implement all my
platform goals.”
i
s
Official critiques system expansion
□ Higher education
commissioner says UT
- A&M campus fight
should stop.
HOUSTON (AP) — The two
largest universities in Texas need
to quit squabbling over new cam
pus sites, the state’s higher edu
cation commissioner says.
See related story. Page 11
“There are more schools and
students in either the (Texas)
A&M or UT (University of Texas)
system than many states in this
country have in their entire state
university systems,” says Texas
Higher Education Commissioner
Kenneth Ashworth.
Recent moves by both
schools to add more campuses
have some education observers
speculating that both Texas
A&M and UT are getting too
big for the good of Texas.
There’s the recent action by
legislators to transfer a Laredo
university from the Texas A&M
system to the University of Texas
system.
There already has been ani
mosity stirred among alumni of
state public colleges gobbled up
by UT or Texas A&M because
their alma maters have changed
names to adapt to new ties.
Ashworth be
lieves management
of such diverse sys
tems might become
too unwieldy and
too much responsi
bility for just two
governing boards
of regents, particu
larly since the
number of college
students is expect
ed to grow to more
than a million dur-
ing the first decade
of the next century.
“Some of the campuses are just
not going to get the attention they
need from a board of regents
whose attention span is spread
too thinly,” Ashworth said.
Of the five university sys
tems operating in Texas, the
University of Texas System is
the largest, with nine academic
campuses and six medical
school campuses. Total enroll
ment: 152,014 students. Texas
A&M is second, with eight aca
demic campuses and 75,906
students.
Focus on university systems
"Some of the campuses are just not
going to get the attention they
need from a board of regents
whose attention span is spread too
thinly."
— Kenneth Ashivorth,
Texas Higher Education Commissioner
intensified recently because of an
effort by Rio Grande Valley legis
lators to have Texas A&M Inter
national University-Laredo,
which only recently became part
of the Texas A&M system,
switched to the University of
Texas system.
Nick Rodnicki/THE Battalion
Spring fever
Matt Ivey, a freshman biomedical science major and James Younts, a sophomore kinesiology
major take a break to play catch in the nice weather on Gen. Ormond R. Simpson Drill Field.
Energy, food prices decrease
□ The Producer Price
Index did not increase
for the month of
March.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The
cost of energy and food fell at the
wholesale level in March, giving
the country its best news on
prices in five months and sug
gesting the economy was still on
the Federal Reserve’s glide path
for a “soft landing.”
The Labor Department re
ported that its FYoducer F*rice In
dex, after posting worrisome
gains of 0.3 percent in both Jan
uary and February, showed no
increase at all in March, as the
price of gasoline, autos and wom
en’s clothing dropped.
Financial markets initially
rallied on the news with econo
mists taking heart from the fact
that the steep slide in the dollar
has so far failed to show up in
higher prices.
But the gains melted away
later in the day after remarks by
Federal Reserve board member
Janet Yellen called into question
the market’s view that the Fed is
through raising interest rates.
The Dow Jones industrial av
erage finished the day down
11.07 at 4,187.08. Bond prices,
however, were up, pushing the
yield on Treasury’s benchmark
30-year bond down to 7.37 per
cent in late trading as many in
vestors continued to hold to the
view that benign inflation re
ports were showing the Fed’s
string of seven rate increases
had accomplished its inflation
fighting goals.