4A - Monday, April 13, 2009
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GARY GRACA ROBERT SOAVE COURTNEY RATKOWIAK
EDITOR IN CHIEF EDITORIAL PAGE EDITOR MANAGING EDITOR j
Unsigned editorials reflect the official position of the Daily's editorial board. All other signed articles
and illustrations represent solely the views of their authors.
Gettin the wrong idea
Universities must not dismiss students for personal reasons
ne of the reasons many students choose to attend graduate
schools is their open-mindedness. There's an understand-
ing that these programs will accept many different points
of view and facilitate discussion between them. It's these positive
qualities of academia that make recent events at Eastern Michigan
University so troubling. An EMU student was recently dismissed
from her graduate program because her personal beliefs clashed
with the administration. And while the circumstances that led to
her dismissal were complicated, they amount to a serious disregard
for academic freedom. In cases like these, universities should be
wary that access to education must not become limited to only those
students who subscribe to a certain ideological viewpoint.
Julea Ward, a graduate student in EMU's
Counseling program, was dismissed in
March after she asked for a client in her
practicum course to be reassigned to
another counselor. Ward claimed that she
did not feel comfortable advising the cli-
ent because his sexual orientation went
against her religious beliefs. After the cli-
ent was reassigned, Ward's advisor, Prof.
Yvonne Calloway, claimed that she was
violating the American Counseling Asso-
ciation Code of Ethics, which states that
no client should be discriminated against
based on, among other things, sexual ori-
entation.
Ward was then brought under review.
A panel of professors questioned her on
a number of other issues, including abor-
tion and extra-marital sex, and she said
she would still feel comfortable being able
to discuss those issues with clients. The
panel ruled that Ward was in violation of
the code and the university dismissed her.
On April 2, the Alliance Defense Fund Cen-
ter for Academic Freedom filed suit against
EMU on behalf of Ward, claiming that the
university had violated Ward's First and
Fourteenth Amendment rights.
It's tough not to see Ward as the victim
in this situation. Though her views on
homosexuality are misinformed, backward
and wrong, they are her personal views.
Attempting to counsel the client in spite of
these views would have been a disservice
to the client, and referring him was the
best course of action. This was in fact the
course of action recommended by Callo-
way, who then turned around and charged
Ward with a violation of the code.
It would appear that Calloway and the
review panel dismissed Ward for no other
reason than that they found her views dis-
tasteful and wanted to send a message.
That's a problem - because graduate pro-
grams should be places where different
views are accepted, not purged. Though a
counseling program may not be the best
forum for ideological debate, this program
should certainly not exclude people based
on personal beliefs. After all, the best way
to change Ward's backward personal opin-
ion on homosexuality is for her to come
into contact with opposing viewpoints of
other students at EMU.
Ironically, it's EMU's treatment of Ward
- rather than Ward's treatment of her cli-
ent - that amounts to discrimination. If
faculty and administrators are specifically
targeting students for dismissal because of
their personal beliefs, the educational sys-
tem has squandered one of its most impor-
tant features: tolerance for people who
think differently.
Ward's treatment is an example of the
dangers of an academic climate that fails
to tolerate different ideologies. In situa-
tions like this, everyone loses. Universities
lose the ability to benefit from different
viewpoints - no matter how radical - and
education becomes something that is lim-
ited to a distinct type of person who holds
certain beliefs.
For the sake of both academic freedom
and ideological diversity in the classroom,
cases like Ward's can't become the norm at
universities.
Your family is saving a chocolate Easter egg
for you. Unless your son eats it first'
- Andrea Phillips, wife of Richard Phillips, the captain being held hostage by Somali pirates, in a note
given to her husband upon his rescue, as reported yesterday by The New York Times.
CHRIS KOSLOWSKI I T PATg' E-MAIL CHRISAT CSKOSLOW@UMICH.EDU
apped dbo TersSpeakin of Transformers,
iratesman? They're paec now too. what happened to
ow.What happened From speakeasies and whisky Michael Bay
to maps and bur ed treasure? 0 tocamera-phone qalty 6Nothing He aysuac
O Prates used to be so coo Transformers DYDs. Sad.
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Taking Detroit for a ride
W e're coming up on the 35th The answer is yes, of course. And to provide a much-needed distraction
anniversary of a Supreme for an explanation, it's helpful to look for out-of-work Michiganders - were
Court case involving pub- at how we got here. held at the Palace of Auburn Hills and
lie schools in Mich- The phenomena that racially polar- not within the city of Detroit itself.
igan that you may ized the Detroit area are the same In what other city would that be a
have never heard ones that wreaked havoc on race rela- problem? People would just get on the
about - but its con- tions across the country for much of subway and go. But that's not possible
sequences are all the mid to late 20th century - ten- in Detroit. The people Leno wanted
around us. In the sions accompanying the civil rights to help - the recently unemployed,
1974 case of Millik- movement, redlining, white flight who may have lost their cars - had no
en v. Bradley, a 5-4 and growing unemployment. These way to get to Auburn Hills. It's simply
decision deemed things segregated neighborhoods and mind-boggling.
cross-district bus- schools in many major metro areas,
ing an unconsti- IMRAN but all of them hit Detroit especially
tutional means SYED hard.
of integrating Other similarly situated cities were H ow w e missed
schools, able to somewhat mitigate the effects
The policy involves sending kids of segregation in part because they an opportunity to
to schools that may be farther away had what the Motor City did not: a
in order to better integrate them. viable, comprehensive public transit integrate the city.
While one may argue that there's system. While those regions may haveciy
nothing inherently unconstitutional been segregated in terms of housing,
about cross-district busing (states, at least disparate groups of people
with their power over schools, argu- still had the ability to travel freely Since we can't use public transit as
ably have the mandate to effect such within the region. a Band-aid here in the Detroit area, a
a remedy), it's actually quite stunning Most major metro areas devel- more grassroots, holistic solution -
that four justices supported the plan oped light-rail transit 50 years ago, as challenging as that will be - may
- considering how intuitively offen- but debate over that issue never gave be the only answer. I don't know what
sive cross-district busingseems. way to a solution in Detroit. General exactly that solution is, but perhaps
The Milliken decision was an Motors's insistence that (GM-built) we should once again turn to schools.
opportunity lost. Had cross-district buses, not trains,were the solution for Schools in the Detroit area were
busing been upheld, the actual pur- Detroit undoubtedly swayed public desegregated, of course, but never
pose of remedial busing would have officials, and by the time they realized became truly integrated. Had that
been met. By the time I attended pub- that city buses were no substitute for happened, the regional disparity in
lic schools in Detroit and its suburbs trains, it was too late to build a cheap, terms or race and prosperity would
25 years later, the problem would have comprehensive subway system. never have taken root. Knowing their
been solved, all districts would have This unfortunate scenario has had children could go to school anywhere
reached what courts call "unitary repercussions that University stu- in the region regardless of where they
status" and such remedies would no dents know all about. For all the big lived would have prevented parents
longer have been needed. But instead, games, nice restaurants, music clubs from actively moving to or from cer-
cross-district busing was defeated in and museums in Detroit, there's just tain areas. Tax bases would not have
the Supreme Court and the problem no feasible way to get to these things shifted so drastically and neighbor-
of de facto segregation in major met- without a car. hoods would be more integrated.
ropolitan areas - in schools and else- Besides the sheer inconvenience, In short, the solution the Supreme
where - never went away. the systemic immobilization that Court rejected in Milliken would
The Detroit area is one of the most results from the lack of a viable pub- have made the problem go away long
segregated regions in the country. lic transit system serves to reinforce ago. But instead, we've had 35 bonus
You might wonder exactly what that boundaries in our unfortunately seg- years of segregation.
means in this day and age. Could regated region. Don't believe me?
segregated regions still be so much For proof, look at the recent flap over - Imran Syed was the Daily's
of a problem with, you know, Barack comedian Jay Leno's free comedy editorial page editor in 2007. He can
Obama being president and all? shows. The shows - which Leno did be reached at galad@umich.edu.
The Daily is looking for a diverse group of strong, informed writers to be columnists
during the spring and summer semesters. Columnists write 750 words
on a topic of their choice every other week.
E-MAIL RACHEL VAN GILDER AT RACHELVG@UMICH.EDU FOR MORE INFORMATION.
GREGORY WAGNERx jV WP -
The future of the space race
0
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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
SEND LETTERS TO: TOTHEDAILY@UMICH.EDU
AmeriCorps is a worthwhile Students today are often thrust into college
experience for students immediately after they graduate from high
school. Armed only with adolescent experience
and the advice of our parents, we're expected
TO THE DAILY: to pick the classes and profession that will give
A number of recent pieces in the Daily have us the happiest life possible. Summer intern-
encouraged me to write in support of the ships and extracurriculars may help to guide
AmeriCorps program (AmeriCorps gets boost us, but without a knowledge of what real work
in federal funding, 04/06/2009). I spent almost and real life entail, it seems foolish to assume
a year in full-time service with the program we're prepared for "real life." AmeriCorps
between my junior and senior years. I can say gave me the chance to sample the post-gradu-
that it was, without a doubt, the best decision I ation world before being fully committed to it.
have made in my undergraduate career. And to be blunt, I got a pretty unique chance
While hitchhiking through Yosemite to figure out what was awesome and what was
National Park in the summer of 2007, I got terrible.
picked up by a girl about my age. She asked me On top of making great friends and doing
what I was doing in the park. I was rock climb- amazing things, I was paid, provided with
ing, dirt-bagging and generally avoiding the health insurance and received a $5,000 bonus
real world. When asked what she was doing, I can spend on anything relating to my educa-
she replied, "Volunteering for AmeriCorps." tion. I urge anyone interested in doing com-
Those three magical words would shape my munity service, taking a break from school
life forever. or getting a job after graduation (or all three)
I applied for the position she had had and to visit the AmeriCorps website and read tes-
was presented with the wonderful opportu- timonials of other program graduates. And if
nity to spend 2008 in the Sierra Nevada, work- you don't want to wait until after graduation,
ing on environmental restoration, monitoring don't. Takea year off - serve your country and
air and water quality and leading volunteers. serve yourself.
In short, I had an experience so extensive and
valuable I'm sure I still haven't realized its full Becca Sonday
worth. Engineering senior
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On Apr. 12, 1961, Yuri Gagarin chiseled his name into
history forever by becoming the first human to see the
Earth from space. Drifting above the planet's surface in
the Soviets' Vostok 1 capsule, he reflected to ground con-
trol: "The Earth is blue. How wonderful. It is amazing."
Since Yuri's journey, this rare view has been passionately
sought and shared by some privileged men and women.
It is Yuri's milestone in human history and the achieve-
ments of humanity in space since that time that are the
subjects of Yuri's Night, a holiday and worldwide celebra-
tion of space.
What exactly is space? Space is everything. The whole
universe falls within our conception of it. Our concrete
minds will say that space is galaxies, stars, planets, gas
and dust, but it's also a concept - a large and empty
void that is marked by silent grandeur. We are stirred
by images brought from the corners of the universe of
strangely twisting, burning galaxies and of majestic plan-
ets, striped and ringed. Even if we only glance skyward
on a clear night, we can sense the presence of the stars.
Space holds mysteries that challenge us to explore. Some
say that space is a blank slate where the past is of no con-
sequence, a place where humanity can learn to live and
start anew.
Space is important to us. It supports integral compo-
nents of our civilization, even if we are not aware of it:
entertainment, communication, weather prediction and
GPS. It allows for telescopes and observatories, the explo-
ration of the solar system and experiments in zero-grav-
ity, not to mention the forthcoming industries of space
tourism and habitation.
But beyond the mere practical benefits, space can
inspire us. The emotions we attach to space can be tapped
to unite individuals and motivate diverse groups of peo-
ple. An easy example of this power was the Apollo mis-
sions. Hundreds of thousands of engineers, scientists and
laborers devoted themselves to the singular purpose of
delivering a human ambassador to the moon. This pursuit
cost billions of dollars, led to advances in electronics and
materials and persuaded a generation of children to pur-
sue careers in science and mathematics.
Students for the Exploration and Development of Space
is holding a Yuri's Night event on Tuesday, Apr. 14 from 7
to 10 p.m. in the Rackham Amphitheatre. With this event,
we hope to excite passion and motivate a new generation
to pursue goals in the science of space. We believe this
pursuit can lead, as it has before, to innovation and tech-
nological breakthroughs that can benefit all. We will focus
on the commercial side of space exploration and develop-
ment, where we believe the true future of space lies.
Governments, ofcourse, should continue (and increase)
their funding of science missions, interplanetary probes
and great space observatories. But commercial space,
which some say is in the midst of a new space race, shows
the greatest promise to bring space to the doorstep of the
ordinary citizen. In such a quest, innovation and technol-
ogy will advance, too. Tomorrow's event will include a
screening of the documentary film Orphans of Apollo, a
dinner and reception where student groups around cam-
pus will display their purpose and activities - some will
bring actual hardware from current projects - and atalk
on the Google Lunar X PRIZE. So come to the Rackham
Amphitheatre to hear an incredible story about private
human spaceflight and learn more about how you can aid
in the effort to bring people to space - or perhaps travel to
space yourself
Come in order to celebrate the legacy of Yuri Gagarin
and the unknown power of space.
Gregory Wagner is an Engineering senior.
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