4A -- Thursday, February 17, 2011 The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com 4A - Thursday, February 17, 2011 The Michigan Daily - michigandailycom 0 Edited and managed by students at the University of Michigan since 1890. 420 Maynard St. Ann Arbor, MI 48109 tothedaily@michigandaily.com BRUNO STORTINI E-MAIL BRUNO AT BRUNORS@UMICH.EDU STEPHANIE STEINBERG EDITOR IN CHIEF MICHELLE DEWITT and EMILY ORLEY EDITORIAL PAGE EDITORS KYLE SWANSON MANAGING EDITOR t setu te a ShOcye 'x i RS C Competingagainst carbon 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. Not a smart cut Teach for America funding should be maintained While President Barack Obama currently has a lot of issues he's trying to resolve, the one he keeps empha- sizing the importance of education. That is why it's so puzzling that Teach for America - an organization that puts recent college graduates in teaching positions in low-income communities - is losing about $20 million in funding as a result of Obama's new budget. Without proper funding, the reach of the number of gradu- ates TFA can employ and the number of schools it can help will be a drastically limited. cuts are inevitable. They're happening everywhere and to everyone - including the University - but like Washington Post reporter Richard Cohen wrote in a Feb. 15 article, "The federal budget, now $3.8 tril- lion, will never be balanced by trimming this or that program." Not. only will cuts to TFA do minimal damage to the deficit, but the pro- gram is too valuable for Washington to allow it to be sacrificed. TFA is an extremely unique program that equally benefits students and teachers. With the unemployment rate still above 9 percent, jobs for college graduates aren't exactly plen- tiful. TFA provides college graduates with a rare opportunity to receive real-world work experience before being thrust into a com- petitive job market. There are also a variety of benefits for the schools and students in the districts that TFA works in. TFA teachers are well edu- cated and positively contribute to the com- munities that they enter. TFA sends college graduates all over the country to schools that are in desperate need of help and otherwise' couldnt afford full-time educators. The pro- posed cuts to the program would take away more than 400 TFA teachers and put a huge dent in what the program can accomplish. Schools and students need the expertise and knowledge that TFA teachers have to offer, and taking that away would be a deterrent to public education in the country. Education is already below par by many standards, and by decreasing resources for TFA, Washington is only moving in the wrong direction in fixing this problem. The program is particularly popular in Ann Arbor. Many University students rely on TFA for a post-graduation job and are able to take their experiences from college to schools that need them. In 2008, the University had the highest number of applicants to the TFA program. And according to a May 9, 2010 Michigan Daily article, 7 percent of the Uni- versity's 2009 graduating class applied for the program. Additionally, last spring, the Uni- versity partnered with the program to bring a TFA chapter to Detroit. It's clear that Univer- sity students are dedicated, and dependent, on this program. Obama needs to recognize how impor- tant TFA is for college students and public schools. It simultaneously employs recent graduates and strengthens schools that are in need. Cutting funding to TFA goes against everything Obama has said about the impor- tance of education for the nation's future. lobal warming is a problem that simply won't go away. I don't mean to beat a dead polar bear here, but it's true - I Googled it. Most people already know the skin- ny - coal-fired' power plants, cars, trucks and Al Gore's man- bear-pig are all JOE major contribu- SUGIYAMA tors to global warming. Most also know about ways to decrease our carbon footprint. But there are a vast number of people in the know who fail to take action. It's almost painful how many times my room- mates will vacate a room and leave enough lamps on to light Angel Hall. I'm certainly not without fault here, but the idea of melting icecaps is a thought that often looms in my mind. It would appear that flyers and apocalyptic news flashes simply don't grab the public's attention like they used to. Maybe the spirit of competition is the jump start that University students need to actu- ally do what they know they should be doing. This competitive nature is exactly what the student group Kill-a-Watt is using to try to moti- vate the campus. Kill-a-Watt is an idea that was sparked atbthe University of Central Florida ,and has been generously loaned to Engineering junior Matt Friedrichs and LSA junior Katie Kent, who are the co-founders of the University of Michigan branch. It's a campus-wide competition that pits residence hall against resi- dence hall to see who can reduce their energy use by the largest per- centage. This reduction in energy use is reliant on the occupants of the residence halls around campus. Kill-a-Watt is asking students to do the little things that save energy - turn off lights, televisions, laptops, unplug phone chargers not in use, etc. The hope is that the sum of these small efforts will be reflected in the University's monthly energy bill and, more importantly, our car- bon footprint. The United States is notoriously bad when it comes to carbon emis- sions. According to Carbon Foot- print Ltd, the average American emits about 20 metric tons of car- bon per year. This is about 16 metric tons more than people through- out the rest of the world. Even the world's average carbon footprint is too large to combat climate change. Ideally, average world carbon emis- sions should be at about 2 metric tons per person - 10 times less car- bon than Americans are currently emitting. Ideal goals and realistic goals are drastically different, but the room for improvement is defi- nitely there. One of the biggest challenges Kill-a-Watt faces is getting a level of participation needed to actually make a difference. "At a school as big Michigan," Friedrichs wrote in an e-mail, "it is always hard to get a lot of students engaged in an event like this. To overcome this chal- lenge we will combine competition, publicity and incentives to engage students." Friedrichs explained that the publicity campaigns will go "beyond a sticker on the wall" by tapping into existing networks of resident advisors, the housing staffs and the program Planet Blue to promote the event and remind students of ways to reduce energy. The hope is to take advantage of the influence that residential advi- sors carry with their halls. This can be achieved by working the Kill-a- Watt challenge into residence hall meetings or with friendly remind- ers to turn off lights. Though it doesn't seem like much, the point of the competition is to show how doing these little things can make a remarkable difference. What could set Kill-a-Watt apart from similar groups is the tangible results it will provide. The percent reduction of total monthly energy use for each residence hall will be reported so students will see the difference they're making. Kill-a-Watt can provide tangible results. Perhaps the greatest asset the group has to offer is the spirit of competition and prospect of prizes. University students live for com- petition, whether it's in the class- room or around campus. Sprinkle in a little cash or gift cards and Kill-a-Watt could have a winning combination to become a reputable organization. Though Kill-a-Watt is still in the production phase, the hope is to begin the 2011 fall semester with this month-long competition. The ultimate goal of reducing our car- bon footprint is something that should be admired. With any luck Kill-a-Watt will surpass the scope of the competition and make energy efficient practices a part of the way of life for University students. -Joe Sugiyama can be reached at jmsugi@umich.edu. EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBERS: Aida Ali, Will Butler, Michelle DeWitt, Ashley Griesshammer, Melanie Kruvelis, Erika Mayer, Harsha Nahata, Emily Orley, Harsha Panduranga, Teddy Papes, Asa Smith, Seth Soderborg, Andrew Weiner LET TERS O I SEND LETTERS TO: TOTHEDAILY@MICHIGANDAILY.COM Personal choice is limited by government regulations TO THE DAILY: On the subject of Michelle Obama's efforts to fight obesity, Michigan Daily columnist Dar-Wei Chen makes the false claim that no government official, not even Ms. Obama, "is trying to tell anyone how to live," ('Let's move' toward 'socialism', 2/13/11). Alas, if only this were true. Chen may not be aware, but last November, the Food and Drug Administration proposed forcing cigarette companies to print pictures of dead and dying people on its products to deter smokers. Government officials in New York went a step further by requiring con- venience store owners to post pictures of charred lungs and yellow teeth in shop win- dows. Opponents of the law sued on First Amendment grounds, it was struck down and the city appealed the decision. Study abroad programs in Israel are a safe option TO THE DAILY: I am responding to Hamdan Azhar's view- point discussing the situation in Israel and Palestine (A Palestinian-Israeli approach, 2/2/11) As a member of WolvPAC, I would like to clarify some issues that arose in this article. First and foremost, I want to stress the fact that many universities around the United States have a study abroad program to Israel that has been both beneficial and, more importantly, a safe trip. A trip to Israel could provide University What about Four Loko, the alcoholic ener- gy drink that was regulated out of existence last year by the FDA? Government officials decided that no one should be allowed to consume the equivalent of a cup of coffee and a couple shots of Vodka. There's also medical marijuana and its many users, who are still subject to federal SWAT team raids, even in states where the substance has been legalized. But even if we remain within the bounds of Chen's topic - obesity - we find prohibition- ist government action. He might remember, for instance, the city of San Francisco ban- ning McDonalds Happy Meals last year. So not only are government officials telling us "how to live," they are actively forcing us - at gunpoint if you're the victim of a federal raid - not to drink, or eat, or smoke certain products. Robby Soave Alum and former Daily editorial page editor students with a culturally enriching and historical experience that many other coun- tries simply could not offer. Azhar noted that there have been safety concerns with stu- dents traveling to Israel, but I believe there are always safety threats when an individual travels outside the U.S. Multiple organiza- tions - for example, Birthright - take stu- dents to Israel and have never experienced any major problems. On another note, I agree that a joint Palestinian-Israeli study abroad program could be successful, but the focus for WolvPAC is just to create a study abroad program to Israel. Matthew Steinway LSA freshman - he Science Savy: Nick Clift talks about Jeopardy's newest contestant-- IBM computer, Watson. UUGo to michigandaily.com/blogs/The Podium CHRIS ARMSTRONG | Bring bullying into thelight s When I reflect back on this past semester, I acknowl- edge the trials that I faced with a grain of salt. The attacks I confronted from former Michigan assistant attorney general Andrew Shirvell were harsh and inexcusable by anyone's standards. The University, however, responded with a unified voice in support of the LGBT community, to tell Shirvell and those who hold similar views that such conduct is not permissible in our community and an otherwise horrible incident was turned into something positive for Michigan. I was lucky. I was a member of a community that taught me how to handle a situation like this, how to hold strong and how to remain poised in the face of adversity. I belong to a community that would not stand for unwarranted attacks on any targeted person or group, no matter what kind of bully. But not every student has this resource today in America. It saddens me to know that while some of us are privileged to live in communities that protect our students from bullies, other students across the nation aren't as lucky, and may not have access to a supportive community. We live in a nation that sits idly by as those around us are taunted, mocked, ridiculed and even attacked because they are different. We live in a nation where bullying is looked on as a rite of passage for students. Bullying is treated as a problem without a solution - an issue schools must simply cope with. Sixty to 80 percent of all students are bullied during their primary and secondary education, and bullying victims are up to nine times more likely to consider suicide during this time. Despite the epidemic in schools, many school administrators still view bullying as a non-issue. Worst of all, students who are bullied don't saying anything to administrators for fear of what their bullies may do to them. This is why students at the University are standing up and fighting back. On Saturday, Feb. 19 students at the University will be traveling to the Ypsi- lanti District Library to support the kick-off of a state- wide Anti-Bullying campaign. All students deserve their chance to feel safe and protected when they go to school, and University students will be taking the first step to ensure that happens. We must advocate for nothing less than zero-tol- erance bullying policies in our communities if we want attitudes toward bullying to change. There is no excuse for anyone who witnesses bullying and does not step in. We all have to be brave enough to take a stand whenever necessary and challenge those around us to do the same. We need our towns, cities and states to create support networks for those who have been tar- geted, no matter what they have been targeted for. We need policies that reward those who say something when they combat bullying in schools. Students in our country deserve communities that won't supportstanding idly by. We must prove to those students who are terrified to go to school everyday because of what others might think, say or do to them that they have a support network now - not that they will have one in the future. Bullying should not be seen as a precursor to vio- lence, but should be treated as an act of violence. If we continue to ignore the impact of bullying on our schools, we all will be committing an act of violence against our country's youth. I hope every community feels the need to take action to protect their youth and stop bullying. The Michigan Student Assembly will be providing free transporta- tion to the anti-bullying conference this Saturday, Feb. 19. If you would like to reserve a spot, please visit www. msa.umich.edu. All students are welcome. Chris Armstrong is the president of the Michigan Student Assembly. He can be reached at charmstr@umich.edu. LETTERS TO THE EDITOR: Readers are encouraged to submit letters to the editor. Letters should be fewer than 300 words and must include the writer's full name and University affiliation. We do not print anonymous letters. Send letters to tothedaily@michigandaily.com