4 -Friday, April 3, 2009 The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com4 E-MAIL BELLA AT BELLZ@UMICH.EDU. Edited and managed by students at the University of Michigan since 1890. 420 Maynard St. Ann Arbor, MI 48109 tothedaily@umich.edu GARY GRACA ROBERT SOAVE COURTNEY RATKOWIAK EDITOR IN CHIEF EDITORIAL PAGE EDITOR MANAGING EDITOR Unsigned editorials reflect the official position oftthe Daily's editorial board. All other signed articles and illustrations represent solely the views of their authors. A poor policy for colleges Schools should accept more disadvantaged students T he University isn't the only college with money troubles. Some universities, faced with shrinking budgets and an increasing number of students in need of financial aid, are even resorting to the poor practice of determining admissions based on which students can better afford college. This means that wealthier students who can pay for their education could be more likely to gain admittance into college than a student who would require financial aid. While certainly a cost-saving move, univer- sities should steer away from this policy because it stands in the way of providing the less advantaged with an equal opportunity for education. BELLA SHAH At's. nq I 1/ -\ _________________ ~\t 4 Dumping dating advice According to an article in The New York Times on March 30, some colleges are now considering students' abilityto paytuition as one of the deciding factors in the admissions process. Among the colleges are Brandeis University in Massachusetts and Bowdoin College in Maine. One way these universi- ties are implementing this new policy is by increasing the admissions of students who are more likely to pay the full cost - like transfer, wait-listed and international stu- dents. The article also clarified that finan- cial ability becomes a factor for "students at the margins, the ones who would probably be 'maybes' when the admissions commit- tee considered applications." Though the colleges using this new policy have admitted that it would hinder socioeconomic diversity on their campus- es, many argue that the current economic crisis leaves them with few options. They asser they will not be cutting down on financial aid. Instead, accepting more stu- dents at full cost allows them to afford the higher number of students who need finan- cial aid. But admissions shouldn't ever favor stu- dents merely because they are wealthy. In fact, less financially advantaged students are in greater need of college educations. Higher education works to bridge socio- economic gaps and stop cycles of poverty. Quality education gives students, regard- less of current economic standing, a chance for better jobs and a better future. And in times of economic crisis, the need to make higher education available for every- one is even more crucial. The only way to heal the floundering economy is to give the least advantaged members of society equal access to opportunity. As the manufacturing-based economy fails, is an economy based in new industries like economic energy and research is emerging. These industries require work- ers with college degrees. And leaving disad- vantaged students out of this trend will only widen the destructive wealth inequality in this country. Policies that favor wealthy students are also often blatantly shallow. In the Times article, Steven Syverson, the dean of admis- sions and financial aid at Lawrence Univer- sity in Wisconsin, said, "We're only human, they shine a little brighter." But students from less advantaged backgrounds offer unique outlooks and a diverse perspective that benefit university communities. Admittedly, universities struggling to make ends meet are going to have to cut costs somewhere. But increasing the admission of students who can pay the full price sacrifices the point of educa- tion. Instead of taking the easy way out by selecting financially stable students and ignoring the plights of others, colleges should not deviate from the very necessary goal of accepting qualified students of all economic backgrounds. '11 be honest. I'm pretty bad at dating - and by that, I mean get- tingthe chutzpah to ask someone out and have them say yes. I struggle with showing my interestkin a girl and picking up on flirting. Texting - a skill that can ensure or push away the affec- tion of another - is my Achilles' heel. NEIL I certainly try to TAMBE set up dinner, des- sert or an evening out with those that catch my eye but things don't work out very often. And I think there are many guys and girls who feel this way about themselves. Dating is hard. So what do we unsuccessful dat- ers do? We get advice about what to do from friends. We try to compare notes and benchmark our progress against what we consider to be an ideal courtship. We analyze every moment of every interaction with prospective significant others. We send text messages by committee and script phone conversations as a team. Surely two heads must be better than one, we think. Well, we're wrong. I'm going to avoid dating advice as much as I can from now on. I've realized that almost all of it is poorly informed, not appli- cable or downright terrible. In fact, most of the dating advice I receive usually makes things worse. I think it makes the process much more stressful. Getting advice about dat- ing can be paralyzing because it's so easy to build anxiety by talking about our relationships. Instead of reduc- ing awkwardness, dating advice does the opposite because it adds nervous pressure to the mix and makes me more awkward and self-conscious. I polled several friends with one question: Have you ever received any good dating advice? They looked at each other and thought about it for a few moments. Then, with surprised looks on their faces, they replied that they hadn't. I haven't either, and I don't think many have. Getting sound dating advice is tremendously diffi- cult because of the level of nuance in. the interactions between two people. It's hard for the periled dater to artic- ulate the proper contextual details, and for the well-intentioned adviser to have enough information to give relevant advice. Intensive conversa- tions don't happen in everyday dat- ing strategy discussions between friends. You'd think that if anyone would be able to deliver good dating advice, it would be successful couples. But two friends of mine who are engaged and have a strong relationship noted that people in healthy relationships don't often know how they got into them in the first place. Relationships rarely are forced or contrived. Rather, they spontaneous- ly emerge within mostly uncontrol- lable circumstances. If so, how would anyone, regardless of how much of a dating expert they are, be able to give good dating advice? Take the example of writing to a dating advice columnist. A reader submits a brief letter about their troubles. Then the advice columnist delivers a response which tries to solve what might be a deeply compli- cated relationship problem - in 750 words or less. Reducing the complex- ity of human relationships to easily dispensable sound bytes is as point- less in an advice column as it is in a simple conversation. There are some bits of advice that Friends probably aren't so lucky in love, either. I consider to be important, like being yourself, not trying too hard, being open to meeting people and being faithful, for example. It doesn't take a long conversation to discover these truths. They are truisms about dat- ing that are conveyed to people at a young age. That isn't to say that abstaining from discussions about dating is the right idea either, even if most dating advice is ill-conceived. Talking about dating brings people closer together and can help build the confidence to keep on trying. Sometimes we need a reminder of dating truisms, and there's nothing wrong with venting. For every nine pieces of bad advice, there might beone good piece. When it comes to dating advice, one thing is true - buyer beware. How you act on the advice you get might determine whether or not you have dinner plans next Friday. -Neil Tambe can be reached at ntambe@umich.edu. EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBERS: Nina Amilineni, Emad Ansari, Emily Barton, Elise Baun, Harun Buljina, Ben Caleca, Satyajeet Deshmukh, Brian Flaherty, Emmarie Huetteman, Emma Jeszke, Sutha K Kanagasingam, Shannon Kellman, Jeremy Levy, Erika Mayer, Edward McPhee, Matthew Shutler, Neil Tambe, Radhika Upadhyaya, Rachel Van Gilder, Laura Veith CHRIS CHILES| fiings The fail ingWar on Drugs LETTERS TO THE EDITOR: Readers are encouraged to submit letters to the editor. Letters should be less than 300 words and must include the writer's full name and University affiliation. Letters are edited for style, length, clarity and accuracy. All submissions become property of the Daily: We do not print anonymous letters. Send letters to tothedaily@umich.edu. Doing somethingfor Detroit Most people would agree that the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are causing great stress on our country, whether or not they believe those wars are necessary. But there is another war that America is fighting that is not merely difficult but actually impossible to win - the War on Drugs. The War on Drugs is now entering its 40th year in U.S. policy, making it our nation's lon- gest-running war. And though extravagant efforts have been made to eliminate the supply of certain drugs, we have not seen great reduc- tion in their availability. Drug enforcement teams may occasionally catch a large supplier but another criminal entrepreneur always fills the position. So what can we do when efforts to eliminate drugs appear futile? First, the war's goal must be clarified. Is our goal to simply reduce drug use to an absolute minimum, even if that leads to increases in violence and crime? All aspects considered, the goal should be to reduce overall harm to society, taking into account the harms caused by drug abuse and by enforcement of drug laws. I say "harms caused by enforcement" because many drug-related problems in our society are not a result of drug use itself but rather of the surrounding poli- cies - namely, prohibition. Prohibition creates the black market that funds gangs and cartels. This has led to massive amounts of violence in the U.S. and other countries. In Mexico, the drug war is escalating, and prohibition-related deaths last year numbered in the thousands. This violence happened during the prohibi- tion of alcohol and it's happening again with the prohibition of other drugs. So how is this current situation different? Unfortunately, the Drug War has been going on for so long in our society that people lack the imagination of a society where drugs are legal. This was not the case when alcohol prohibition was repealed. This is one of the main reasons people cur- rently fear the legalization of drugs. It seems as though talking about drugs is also taboo, and this certainly hinders any productive discus- sion on how they should be treated in society. Fortunately, the topic of legalization, par- ticularly with regard to marijuana, is begin- ning to be discussed in a much more open and honest manner. As the executive director of the University's Students for Sensible Drug Policy chapter, I couldn't be happier. The drug policy reform movement is growing extraordinarily fast, and SSDP is experiencing outstanding development and growth. We now have over 150 chapters at universities across the U.S., with a network building in Canada, as well as parts of Europe and Africa. Our chapters often work on local initiatives and campaigns as well as organize educational events. The SSDP chapter at the University is host- ing the regional conference for all Midwestern chapters this Sunday. The event is open to the public and will be a great opportunity for edu- cation as well as networking. More information on the conference and registration is available at our website, ww.umdrugpolicy.org. I would like to point out one last thing - I often get asked if the SSDP organizes Hash Bash. The answer is, simply, no. Actually, it's more like, "No!" (for the hundredth time). Hash Bash is mainly a cultural event, and SSDP is strictly a political organization. Our concern is drug policy, not drug use. It's important to understand that although marijuana smokers are a part of the drug policy reform movement, we are much more than that. I would rather see people going to the Mich- igan Social Justice Conference on Saturday instead, which will actually includea workshop with SSDP. Making a difference and changing the world for the better gives me the best high there is. Attend the conference on Saturday or our Midwest SSDP Conference on Sunday, and you may just experience that yourself. Chris Chiles is an LSA junior. Growing up in Ann Arbor, I've always experienced the state's steady decline into recession at arm's length. The Uni- versity has in many ways buffered this city economically. Althougheachbusi- ness and individual O is under increasing fiscal pressure, the fabric of the city is strong. MEG Despite Michi- YOUNG gan's renowned woes, the Univer- sity has been setting records for fundraising, creating the nation's fastest-growing endowment over the last 20 years. The amoung of money spent is tangible - construction on campus has reached a fever pitch. Students usually don't have means of transportation outside of campus, let alone Ann Arbor. This insulates us from the rest of the state at a time when we need to be aware of what we'll return to when we leave our ivory tower. Don't let me generalize about your experience. Students are finding it more difficult to find jobs and to pay for rent, food and tuition. We don't need to go to Detroit to find problems. But you can't deny the stark contrast between these two cities, even though Detroit is a mere 40 minutes away. Michigan was in recession long before the rest of the country. At the moment, Detroit is synonymous with the failing auto industry and the ripple effect those lost jobs have on Michigan communities. In fact, Detroit's hardships can be traced to more than a recession or lost auto jobs. But thankfully, people at the Uni- versity are beginning to forge oppor- tunities to volunteer or do social justice work, especially in Detroit. The work is certainly only symbolic if it's not directed by or in collaboration with Detroit residents. When Ann Arbor students get involved on their own, they are showing their com- mitment to Detroit because they are understand its importance. The Detroit Partnership creates opportunities for service learning in the city. Its website speaks to the value it places in long-term insti- tutional relationships, reciprocity and reflective self-awareness. Other campus student groups are getting involved, from the labor activist group Students Organizing for Labor and Economic Equality's poll-watch- ing in the presidential election to the Ross School of Business's Net Impact group planting trees with Greening of Detroit this Saturday. Increasingly, classes have been offered exclusively in Detroit. Some have become a "study abroad" expe- rience. Semester in Detroit brings Wayne State's campus and Residen- tial College professors together. Each student takes a job in a city commu- nity or cultural organization. Some classes aren't focused specif- ically on Detroit, but the city is inevi- tably brought to the forefront. Last semester, four people in Prof. Rebec- ca Hardin's corporate ethnography seminar wrote research-intensive papers on environmental justice in Detroit. In the Global Change class, Prof. Tom Gladwin of the Business School wrapped up his final lecture with a discussion of global inequality and how it is reflected in Ann Arbor and Detroit. He called on us all to do something. "Givingback" hasn'tbeen apriority for most students for various reasons. We're all very busy. No doubt, stu- dents have more power after getting their degrees, but gaining communi- ty service experience while we are in school can actually help to shape our goals. It's also a place where problems are abstract or analyzed statistically, or felt to be too complex to be able to change. It's amazing to me to see people at the University recognize a responsibility, or at least an ability, to act. What those inside the bubble can do for those outside. Others see the quality of a Univer- sity degree as the only reimbursement Michigan needs. Higher education creates human capital that has the potential to attract high-paying sci- ence-based technologies back to the state. It would be nice to be able to say that we owe something to the state, because we go to such a phenomenal, tax-supported public University. But our tuition is rising, as is corporate research funding, and private donors are dealing out luxury facilities with their name attached. Public funding is in long-term decline. Regardless of your reasons, try to find a way out of the Ann Arbor bubble - and especially into service work in Detroit. Professors aren't the only people we should learn from in this time. - Meg Young can be reached at megyoung@umich.edu.