4 - The Michigan Daily - Friday, October 3, 2003 OP/ED £t 420 MAYNARD STREET ANN ARBOR, MI 48109 letters@michigandaily.com NOTABLE QUOTABLE SAM BUTLER THiE SOAPBOX EDITED AND MANAGED BY STUDENTS AT THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN SINCE 1890 LouIE MEIZLISH Editor in Chief AUBREY HENRETTY ZAC PESKOWITZ Editorial Page Editors Unless otherwise noted, unsigned editorials reflect the opinion of the majority of the Daily's editorial board. All other articles, letters and cartoons do not necessarily reflect the opinion of The Michigan Daily. It's like a huge pot of honey that's attracting a lot of flies." IA0 SBIL - 'Af.d~iy \ a4 h ^ _ q. 1, I - Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) on turning Iraq into a major profit center, as reported in The Washington Post. ' tM -ini+"~4s YWiu cM' Yoce + a4yn a. 11lk 1eax Mother Teresa and the Devils SRAVYA CHIRUMAMILLA WEAVING THE HANDBASKET G rowing up, memory as news arrived that Mother Tere- did more harm than good through her mis- March was sa's beatification is scheduled for Oct. 19 at sionary work. By urging paupers to accept known only for the Vatican. Jesus in exchange for food, Mother Teresa Madness. Be it the '93 A countdown until the beatification is misled thousands of Kolkata residents into season with that fateful . displayed prominently on the website dedi- believing that their lives would improve time out or the '98 epic cated to the cause, through conversion to Christianity. battle for the ACC www.motherteresacause.info, which also Leaders who have reserved their lives for Tournament Champi- offers a means of obtaining tickets for the the benefit of others are revered for the work onship between the Tar day. The Associated Press reports that the they have done but not worshiped. For exam- Heels and the Blue Vatican post office has launched a set of ple, Mohandas Gandhi, who also served in Devils, Carolina bas- postcard stamps with Mother Teresa's India, is celebrated tomorrow in the Gandhi ketball ruled our lives. My sister and I image and that factories have been making Day of Service, where thousands of people saved copies of newspapers when Dean rosaries, crucifixes and key chains for the volunteer to better the community. While Smith became the winningest coach and beatification. Mother Teresa's dedication to help others watched a disturbing Spike Lee film Pope John Paul II (sorry Cardinal may be admirable and perhaps worth the because Smith made a cameo. During our Chistoph Schoenborn, he is still alive) has Nobel Peace Prize, her selfish motivations to high school's homecoming, I even won arranged for the beatification to coincide convert others do not warrant the worship of most spirited on college-dress-up day for with the celebration of his 25th year as pope thousands of people. the sheer amount of Carolina memorabilia I this month. Since Mother Teresa was a However repulsive it may be for people possessed (think popcorn bucket and a map favorite of the pope, her beatification has to worship those who deceived thousands, it of the memorable seven-mile stretch been on the fast track ever since her death. is even more reprehensible to bar forms of between Chapel Hill and Durham). The pope waived the standard five-year wait- reverence. Thousands across the world, Thus, I could hardly control my excite- ing period and originally wanted to forgo the from Christians persecuted in China to Mus- ment when seated with a basketball team on entire beatification process and name Mother lims killed in race riots in Gujarat, must be a seven-hour international flight last summer. Teresa a saint, but was forced to retract when saved from the mobs unable to accept a The couple next to me, the team's coach and top cardinals spoke against it. variance in views. his wife, soon explained that the team was The canonization process is lengthy in The particularly dislikable, be they Moth- part of a missionary organization, which trav- that someone needs to undergo "extensive" er Teresa or the Cameron Crazies, must be eled to parts of Africa and competed against investigation to make sure that the two mira- given an opportunity to speak. Much like The local teams. Watching the uniformed team in cles attributed them are true miracles. In fact, Michigan Review, their convoluted percep- zip-ups and Nikes, I couldn't help but mull even after the beatification, the step in the tioris either of people's fates or basketball over the materialistic message the team canonization process that only requires one dynasties usually help strengthen the argu- members were sending. miracle, parishioners can only worship Moth- ments against them. Heated discussions and Then it dawned on me that this was the er Teresa in a few places where the church long discourses about these topics arrive at a exact message they wanted to portray: Their deems appropriate. simple insight that only through the persis- God helped them earn all these luxuries and The worship of a human being who died tence of these differences can one learn to if the infidels converted, they too could share five years ago does not make sense regard- sympathize and create concrete beliefs. in the booty. less of the amount of good she might have The exchange that occurred thousands of done for people around her. In fact, it has Chirumamilla can be reached feet above ground, came rushing back into been popularly debated that Mother Teresa at schiruma@umich.edu. LETTERS TO THE EDITOR Opportunities for women also present in LSA TO THE DAILY: The Women in Science and Engineering Program is pleased the Daily shares its con- cern about the underrepresentation of women in science and engineering, See Jane Engineer (10/01/03). While it is true that the College of Engi- neering has made considerable progress in enrolling women students, often graduating more women at the bachelor's level than any other school in the nation, it is incorrect to state that LSA has not had equally impressive efforts and successes in the sciences and mathematics. Just to provide a few examples, faculty from the Chemistry and Physics departments have worked with over 500 middle school girls in the Future Science: Future Engineer- ing Program. LSA IT routinely provides com- puter stations and support for both FSFE and the Grace Hopper Project for high school girls. The WISE residence program, which has been nationally recognized and honored, has historically been almost half LSA women. The Association for Women in Science is very active within the college. LSA provides space for both the WISE Central Campus office and the WISE research office. The representation of women among LSA science and mathematics majors is impressive, including 61 percent female in biology, 57 percent in cellular and molecular biology, 30 percent in chemistry, and 45 per- cent in mathematics. The number of women in LSA graduate programs is equally impres- sive. In fact, in chemistry graduate programs the percentage of women actually increases to 39 percent. Both the College of Engineering and LSA can be proud of their accomplishments in supporting girls and women in pursuing careers in these non-traditional fields. But we are not satisfied. As the Daily editorial pointed out, there are still far too few women faculty members. Even in this area, the Uni- versity, including LSA, has dedicated signif- icant resources and time through the ADVANCE grant. LSA Associate Dean Abigail Stewart directs this important University-wide initia- tive. The University should be commended for its efforts for women in both science and engineering. T An often-overlooked side effect of this problem is that the few female/minority facul- ty members in these fields are often severely overworked in providing mentorship to female/minority students. Students seek them out for both formal and informal advising and mentoring in far greater numbers than their male/non-minority counterparts. Many of these faculty members end up overburdened with mentoring responsibilities and this ends up hurting their progress towards achieving tenure in disciplines where research produc- tivity is paramount. This perpetuates the prob- lem; when a popular professor is denied tenure, it creates resentment and cynicism among their students. Those who do achieve tenure, however, have much greater flexibility to devote resources to mentoring students. The University has a number of great pro- grams aimed at supporting female and minority students in engineering and the sciences; what is needed here and at other universities is still stronger effort to recruit, retain and tenure female and minority faculty in these fields. In addition, students can always do more to support their peers, as well as organizations like the Girl Scouts that work to pique girls' interest in math and sciences during their pre-college years - helping reduce the need to "catch up with the boys" when they reach college. Such efforts reduce the workload on faculty in areas such as the LSA sciences in attracting students to these programs after entering college. DAVE JORDAN Rackham Coleman hypocritical in creating taskforce, must divest from Israel TO THE DAILY: I could not help but find University Presi- dent Mary Sue Coleman's policies quite hyp- ocritical after reading yesterday's editorial, Ethical purchasing (10/02/03), considering that a year ago, in a letter to the University, Cole- man issued a statement in which she declared she does not support divestment from Israel. I certainly feel that the creation of the Purchas- ing Ethics and Policies Task Force is a step in the right direction, but without a reconsid- eration of our financial ties to Israel, I find it a hollow step. Our investments in Israel are directly and indirectly funding the 36-year occupation of Palestinian land. We are help- Mental health problems real, cannot be cured by just popping pills TO THE DAILY: I commend you for presenting an issue that is often ignored, stigmatized, and misun- derstood, (Mental health problems on the rise for students, 09/29/03). It is important to have a healthy mind and spirit as well as body. Raising awareness and understanding about mental health is extremely important to ensuring good quality of all people. One point that I found particularly interesting is the way that experts and mental health pro- fessionals described the onslaught of students presenting with mental health issues. As true as this may be, we must continue to encour- age people to seek help when they need it. We cannot assume that the stigmas and mis- conceptions about mental health have melted away in recent times. In many communities, people who seek counseling are seen as weak and out of control of their lives. Honestly, how many of us have the same sympathy for someone who has poor academic perfor- mance due to depression or any kind of men- tal health issue versus the sympathy you might feel for someone who suffers from a physical ailment? Would you be willing to offer a job or admission to a student who tries to explain poor academic performance by citing mental health issues? Those stu- dents who walked through the doors of Coun- seling and Psychological Services may have represented a minority of people aware of their own mental health well-being and who felt confident enough to seek help. We have to understand that mental health diseases and conditions are real and you do not have to be "crazy" to suffer from them. People should care for their mental health just as they would monitor their diets and exercise. Another point that is discussed in your article is the cause of depression and anxiety. With the influx of anti-depressants and anxi- ety medications that are being advertised and promoted, many people are probably being misled into thinking that there is a pill that will make them feel better. Though a cause of depression is chemical imbalances in the brain, we cannot ignore the many other fac- tors that also affect a person's affect. Any clinician knows that there is hardly ever a person who walks into an office and has the I~ ~ ~ §v.--......j.-+-+-:'--:.,t