The Michigan Daily -Monday, October 1, 1990 - Page 3
Student finds niche in volunteer work II-
by Jennifer Hirl
'aily Staff Reporter
Students live in comfortable sur-
roundings: heated dorms, beds to
sleep in, three meals a day, and
clothes on their backs. How often
do they open their eyes to face the
poverty in the world, or even their
surrounding communities?
LSA senior Steve Edelstein
stands as an exception, however,
xtending his hand to the less for-
nate not only locally, but na-
tionwide.
"He is one of the rare people
who saw a problem and, instead of
joining with another group, started
an organization that raised thou-
sands of dollars," said Anita Bohn,
the project service representative of
the Michigan Campus Compact, an
organization comprised of 10 uni-
rsities and colleges that encourage
students to become involved in
community service organizations.
"What impresses me most is
that he has drawn so many people
into his organization and he has
made a great difference," she said.
"He's incredible."
Edelstein, a molecular biology
student, is always working to help
others, whether helping out the
Ann Arbor homeless shelters, serv-
ing food in Detroit soup kitchens,
or restoring an old grocery store
into a food bank in a poverty-
stricken Mississippi community.
His interest and dedication in
community service began with his
membership in the Alpha Phi
Omega service fraternity. From his
service in the fraternity's project
called Students Working Against
Today's Hunger (SWAT Hunger),
Edelstein discovered many opportu-
nities for continuous growth. His
aspirations soon evolved into a sep-
arate organization.
"The project that Alpha Phi
Omega did was called SWAT, but it
was different. I expanded it and
changed it around. They were going
to chuck it, but I made it an organi-
zation, got friends involved, and it
took off," Edelstein said.
SWAT Hunger began as a week-
end service project to collect money
for the hungry and poor. Now it has
grown into a year-round commit-
ment for 200 students at eight
Michigan universities and colleges.
During Edelstein's two-year
presidency, SWAT Hunger volun-
teers raised over $21,000. He ex-
plained that the organization re-
ceives most of its funding from
campus projects and some corporate
donations. Members also travel
door-to-door collecting canned food,
prepare and serve meals in soup
kitchens, and work in homeless
shelters.
Since SWAT Hunger raised a
significant amount of money, Edel-
stein wanted to expand community
service outside of Ann Arbor.
"We were donating a lot of
money to lots of groups around the
country, but we didn't see where it
was going," he said. "We wanted it
to be more fulfilling."
Edelstein's generosity led him to
the census books at the library. "I
found that the highest percent of
children living under the poverty
level was in Mississippi. One-third
of all children go to bed hungry...
and that's a lot to generate that
statistic," he said.
Edelstein's inquisition did not
stop here. He immediately contacted
libraries in the Mississippi Delta
Region, and asked librarians for ad-
vice on organizations interested in
working with SWAT Hunger.
Last May, 10 SWAT Hunger
members gathered canned food,
$6,000 from the group's funds, a
grant from USA for Africa, and
traveled to a tiny southern Missis-
sippi town called Grenada.
The students converted a run-
down Grenada grocery store into a
food bank, replacing the floors, the
windows and the bathroom. The
walls were replastered, painted, and
shelves were put up. The govern-
ment and local charities stock the
food bank.
"There's a lot of poor families
that don't have any money. The
food banks are how they eat," Edel-
stein said.
The group's expedition soon be-
came known as the "Michigan
Adopt a City Program," which en-
courages cities with abundance re-
sources to adopt and revitalize one
less fortunate in another area of the
United States or the world. Edel-
stein is running the program.
As a result of the tremendous
community service Edelstein and
SWAT Hunger performed, last year
he won the General Motors Volun-
teer Spirit Award and the Univer-
sity's Outstanding Achievement
Award.
In addition, he was named the
Michigan Humanitarian of the Year
by the Michigan Campus Compact.
This award placed Edelstein as a
state level winner of the National
Campus Compact's 1990 Student
Humanitarian Award. The National
Campus Compact consists of 235
colleges and universities nation-
wide.
8
r-I
Edelstein
"One thing I learned, without
anyone you can't do anything, but
with four or five people you can do
just about anything on this cam-
pus," Edelstein said.
«.
x,
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'
I
Event to
iddress
population
problems
by Bethany Robertson
Researchers from New Delhi,
Scotland, Indonesia, and Moscow
ill gather at the University this
eek for the International Sympo-
sium on Population-Environment
Dynamics.
The symposium, organized by
the University's Population-En-
vironment Dynamics Project, will
address the connection between hu-
man growth, migration, and mortal-
ity and the environment.
"The focus of the conference is to
ok at the complexity of the rela-
tionship between population and the
environment," said symposium co-
ordinator Susan Sharpe.
The keynote address today at 4:00
by University of Chicago professor
William McNeill will be a highlight
of the symposium, Sharpe said.
McNeill, author of the books "The
Rise of the West" and "Population
nd Politics Since 1750" will speak
n the historical perspective of pop-
ulation and environment dynamics.
Other speakers will address popu-
lation trends in Southeast Asia, agri-
cultural modernization in Brazil, and
population-environment effects on
the atmosphere.
All events of the symposium,
which continues through Wednesday,
will take place in the fourth-floor
ssembly hall in the Rackham build-
ing. However, the address by
McNeill will be held in the
Rackham Amphitheater. Sharpe said
seating is limited.
The Population-Environment
Dynamics Project was started in
1988 by the School of Public Health
and the School of Natural Resources.
The project has expanded to in-
clude numerous research projects,
*ncluding one in Zimbabwe,
Mexico, and Indonesia which coordi-
nates information about public
health, agriculture, and industrial
technology for a global perspective
on the environment and world popu-
lation.
Demonstrators rally for
i
emigration of Soviet Jews
iet'
by Sarah Schweitzer
Daily Staff Writer
Approximately 200 Ann Arbor
residents and University students
marched from the Diag to West Park
yesterday to show their support for
Operation Exodus, the world-wide ef-
fort to aid Soviet Jews in their emi-
gration to Israel.
The march and rally were orga-
nized by a coalition of the Jewish
Community Association, the United
Jewish Appeal, the Frankel Center
for Judaic Studies, and Students'
Struggle for Soviet Jewry.
The crowd, mostly composed of
Ann Arbor residents, met on the
Diag at 12:15 and marched to West
Park - located near Huron and
Seventh streets - carrying banners
and signs.
Marchers were welcomed with the
sounds of Israeli music upon arrival
at the park.
Among the speakers at the rally
were Matt Levin, nephew and repre-
sentative of Senator Carl Levin (D-
Michigan), and Lana Pollack, a state
senator from the Ann Arbor area.
Pollack told the crowd that what
is needed most right now is to "keep
the pressure up on the Soviets to
prevent what we fear most, a
pogrom.
Keynote speaker Political Science
Professor Zvi Gitelman said recent
developments in the Soviet Union
have allowed for a greater number of
Soviet Jews to emigrate to the
United States and Israel than ever be-
fore. He said, however, the imple-
mentation of glasnost - "openness"
- policies have led to an up-
swelling of anti-semitism sentiment.
"People are coming home... a
major branch of the Jewish family is
being grafted back onto the Jewish
tree. We must help the Jewish state
welcome back the Jews of the Sovi
Union," Gitelman said.
David Belenky, a recent Soviet-
6migrd and another speaker at the
rally, asked the crowd to remember
that "anything can happen to Jews in
the Soviet Union. Anyone could be
in a Russian Jew's shoes."
First-year law student David
Saperstein said he attended the rally
because of his concern for the anti-
semitism he had seen while visiting
Eastern Europe last April.
He realized during his tour ot
Poland, Czechoslovakia, and Hun-
gary there is "real danger" for Jews
in the Eastern Europe.
"Many students view the problem
(anti-semitism in the Soviet Union)
as something in the abstract, but it
is a real problem which we need to
deal with," Saperstein said.
r
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8
MICHELLE GUY/Daily
Grupo Las Americas, a Venezuelan music and dance group, entertains
the audience as part of the Latino Arts Extravaganza Friday.
1
Islam may replace Communism in Uzbekistan
.y
TASHKENT, USSR (AP) -
Dozens of KGB and police officers
gathered recently around the blue
mosque in Tashkent's crumbling old
city and listened warily as an Islamic
cleric boomed out a call for political
action.
"Allah Akbar (God is Great)"
shouted thousands of male voices in
response to the mullah's call for Is-
lam to replace Communism. A few
miles from the mosque, workers
were building an iron and concrete
fence around the Uzbekistan Com-
munist Party headquarters, which is
being converted to a presidential
palace, local newspapers report.
Workers said the fence will be
electrified to hold back any mobs
that might attack Uzbeck leaders, as
Romanian mobs did during a revolu-
tion in that Balkan nation last year.
"They fear the Romanian vari-
ant," said Abdulrashid Sharif of
Berlik, an Uzbek popular movement.
He said public anger was rising
against the reported corruption of
Uzbekistan's Communist leadership.
Uzbekistan, a central Asian re-
public of 20 million about the size
of soon-to-be united Germany, is a
backwater of poverty at the edge of
the democratic reform sweeping
other parts of the Soviet Union.
Some local leaders have called for
political unity among the Central
Asian republics against the ethnic
Russian-dominated leadership in
Moskow. Unrest has already broken
out in three areas of Uzbekistan, and
the republic's Communist officials
appear to be girding for more
demonstrations.
"We see on television what is
happening in the Baltics, in Russia
and Moldavia," Sharif said.
Unlike their counterparts in the
Baltic and Russian republics, the
Uzbek Communist Party has kept
its grip on power. It banned demon-
strations in February and suppressed
a democratic opposition movement,
activists said.
"In Uzbekistan, the power of the
Communists has not changed since
the days of stagnation," said activist
Igor Kadirov, who lives in the indus-
trial city of Almalyk. The "period of
stagnation" is the Soviet term for
the 1964-82 rule of Leonid Brezh-
nev.
Uzbek reformers have their eyes.
on the new president of the Russian:
Federation, Boris Yeltsin, who quit,
the Communist Party in July and,
has persuaded the legislature to ap-
prove sweeping political and eco-
nomic changes.
Uzbekistan has already exploded:
in ethnic, economic and political vi-"
olence in the Fergana, Andizhan and'
Parkent areas. As many as 800 were,
killed in June in Uzbek-Kirgizd,
clashes in Osh, just over the border'
in Kergizia.
Public universities suffer cuts in funding
by the Associated Press
State budget problems are leading
to more crowded classes, fewer
teachers, and higher tuition at many
public universities across the coun-
try this fall.
"We're in a situation that's dete-
riorating very rapidly," said Richard
Novak, director of state education
policy and finance of the American
r
THE LIST
What's happening in Ann Arbor today
Speakers Meetings
"Researching Organizations and "Students For the Exploration
Employers" --- 4:10- 5:30 pm. and Development of Space" ---
CP&P Room One. 7pm Michigan League, Room D.
"Interviewing"-- 4:10- 5:00 pm. "Indian and Pakistani American
CP&P Conference Rm. Students' Council Weekly
"Employer Presentation: Smith Meeting" --- 6:30pm 219 Angell
Barney, harris Upman & Co."--- Hall, for more info call 998-1791.
5-7 pm Business School- 1016 Furthermore
Paton.
Greek Dance Class --- 8 p.m.
"P4S4 Pyrite, y-Brass and 4703 international center, Call Eleni 434-
other compounds Explained" --- 1496
Inorganic Chemistry Seminar, Free tutoring in lower level math,
Professor S. Lee, Chem bldg. rm. science and engineering courses -
1640. ---M, W, TH 8-10 pm, Rm 307
"Sukka Building" --- Progressive UGLi.
Zionist Caucus, 4pm. Minnie's Co- "'Smoke-Free'- A Stop Smoking
op 307 N. State. ", Program" --- First day of a four
"A Panel Disession on the GuIf week Stnn Smokina nmum 1o m -
Association of State Colleges and
Universities. "What's happening in
Northeastern and Midwestern states
is spreading...They are facing sharp
cuts that will have untold impact on
those institutions.
Among examples found in an
Associated Press survey:
The Florida Board of Regents
has told the state's nine universities
to come up with $49 million in cuts
to help make up a $521 million
state shortfall. Among the possibili-
ties: eliminating the first summer
school term.
The City University of New
York, faced with $42 million in
budget cuts, is tightening enrollment
procedures, cancelling 2,000 classes,
dropping 670 adjunct teachers, and
cutting library hours. This year the
state reduced its contribution to
CUNY's four-year colleges by $29
million, and the city pared its con-
tribution to the community colleges
by $13 million.
After three years of sharp fund-
ing decreases, Maryland Governor
William Schaefer has asked that
higher education funds be cut $41
million during the current fiscal year
because of a $150 million shortfall
in state revenue.
Students staged a "Save UNC"
rally this fall at the University of
North Carolina to protest cuts that
have led to fewer classes and students
sitting on the floor in others.
However, public campuses in
Iowa, Louisiana, Utah, Idaho, Texas,
New Mexico, and Arizona are enjoy-
ing increased state appropriations and
relatively modest tuition increases.
"We were losing renowned pro-
fessors to other states," said Marvin
Roubique, assistant commissioner
for finance of the Louisiana Board of
Regents. "We were not able to com-
pete on a regional and national level
for professors.
"I think the Legislature, the ad-
ministration, and the higher educa-
tion community in general have rec-
ognized that we need to address the
problems of higher education."
But schools in at least 15 states
- most of them in the East and
Midwest where state financial prob-
lems are most severe - are operat-
ing on restricted budgets that have
led to program cuts, fewer and more
crowded classes, and reductions in
faculty positions.
NOWs
Opinion
Photo**
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Still need your help!!
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