4A - Thursday, April 7, 2011 The Michigan Daily - michiganclaily.com 4A - Thursday, April 7, 2011 The Michigan Daily - michigandailycom 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 I'itrss i s.obblePe 5 1 ( soreK i J easss rC .it .- Give college athletes their cut KYLE SWANSON MANAGING EDITOR 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. A delayed reaction DPS alerts must reach students more quickly University employee walking through the Chemistry Build- ing on early Monday morning reported that she saw a man pointing a gun at her. She walked away and returned a few minutes later, and the man was gone. Whenever an incident occurs on campus that involves a potentially armed person, the Univer- sity's Department of Public Safety has a responsibility to imme- diately inform students of the situation using the emergency alert system. Some students instantly received text messages or phone calls from DPS, but many students weren't informed of the event until the next day. DPS needs to ensure that there is a unified emer- gency response to all students when a dangerous situation occurs. According to an April 4 Daily article, DPS spokeswoman Diane Brown chose not to send a crime alert via e-mail because police were nearing an "all clear" of the situation. How- ever, at 1 a.m. on Monday, an emergency alert was sent via text message. Another text mes- sage alert was sent at 1:25 a.m. that informed recipients the situation was "all clear." Stu- dents who had previously signed up for the text messaging service were alerted of the potential danger, but students who were not had no idea. A mass e-mail was finally sent at 10:30 a.m. on Monday that notified all students of the recent events. It's troubling that only some students were informed of a dangerous situation as it was occurring while others received a notification more than nine hours later. All students should have been informedimmediately. Whenever a gun may be involved, regardless of the sever- ity of the situation, DPS should inform every University student. Brown should not have choseto hold off on informing the studentbody of the alleged gun- man until the next morning. Even if the emer- gency was contained and the situation was nearing an "all clear," students have a right to know when a dangerous event is occurring on campus. Since the reported gunman was never found, it was a very real possibility that he was still somewhere on campus after the "all clear" was given. Brown said in the article that police "didn't have solid enough information at midnight to warrant activating the emergency alert," pri- marily because the witness of the crime wasn't certain if the gun was real. Whether or not the employee saw an actual gun, DPS should have sent aprecautionary alertto all students. Their intent to not cause a panic is understandable, but an alert that makes students aware of the scenario and notes that it is not an emergency situation would have been prudent. It's not uncommon for students to walk around campus at midnight - the time when the incident occurred. Students need to know about situations like this in order to take extra precautions and be extremely aware of their surroundings. Regardless of how well DPS felt the situation was contained, it had a responsi- bility to inform the student body of the poten- tially serious situation. Students always need to be aware of their surroundings late at night, and even more so if there is a possible crime. Fortunately, no one was hurt as a result of Monday's incident, but DPS's failure to properly alert the entire stu- dent body was disappointing. Senior year of high school: A man approaches me with a letter in hand. Greedily, I snatch it and rip apart the enve- lope. "Congrat- ulations! The University of Michigan foot- ball program has decided to offer you an athletic scholarship to JOE play..." My rac- SUGIYAMA ing heart stops before I reach the end of the letter, and I collapse on the tile floor of my high school cafeteria. Lucky for me, this situation didn't exactly pan out -= as I'm sure it didn't for thousands of other five-foot- eight offensive linemen - and my life didn't end as a result of receiving a full ride to play football at the Uni- versity. Phew - really dodged a bul- let there. But every day, high school athletes are given the opportunity to go to school for free and play the sport they love as amateurs. Recently though, these scholar- ships have come under fire by former players and experts who feel their service to their university is worth more than a free education. In the HBO series Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel, an exposd examined exactly what the college players of revenue sports - football and basketball - are truly worth to universities well as how they should be compensated. The NFL and NBA pay their play- ers 57 percent of the leagues' total earnings. This percentage seems representative of their worth to each institution - after all, the players are the ones who fill the seats and sell the gear. The earnings of col- lege football and basketball players are a bit more modest. They're paid through education and exposure to the next level of competition. But again, the players create revenue. So why aren't they getting their cut? Enter the non-profit college sports that make up the vast majority of college athletics. Instead of the $275,000 a year that each Michigan football player would be making - according to the precedent set by the NFL - the players receive a scholarship worth between $25,000 and $50,000. This is 9 to 18 percent of the optimal $275,000. Though this discrepancy is extreme, looking strictly at the numbers undervalues the education that is beingreceived. One of the panel discussion mem- bers for Real Sports was former Michigan football coach Rich Rodri- guez. Rodriguez suggested that the value of a scholarship is not fully realized because of the economic backgrounds that many of the play- ers come from. Education may not be a point of emphasis in the fami- lies of the athlete, which may cause him to fall into the mindset that the purpose of his scholarship isn't to learn, but to play football. This misguided point of view could and should be remedied through - wait for it - education. Nearly all my classes in the civil engineering department start with presentations that highlight every- thing that can be accomplished with the education received at the Uni- versity. Talk of suspension bridges and super structures is enough to get any civil engineer's blood pumping and offers insight to how education is the path to professional great- ness. This same idea could easily be translated for the athletes who view course load as an inconvenience rather than a privilege. By educating student-athletes about what they can achieve with their minds, the term student-athlete becomes much more significant. Even with the scholarships that are awarded to football players, it still seems unfair for a group of 85 individuals to make millions of dol- lars for an institution and not be somehow compensated for their contribution. Another suggestion by Rodriguez was to give student- athletes money for their living expenses. Student-athletes are often bogged down by their sport and don't have time to get a job to pay for things like travel to games. Playing a sport is a full-time job, minus the paycheck. Paying players an hourly rate is appropriate. The NCAA should look at their athletes more as members of a work- study program, instead of slaves of an unpaid internship. Paying student-athletes on an hourly basis - at a reasonable rate - would be appropriate compensation for their service to a university. It would also silence the critics who wish for col- lege athletics to remain amateur sports if these "jobs" were compen- sated at the same level as someone who works at the UGLi. Student-athletes carry a burden that I don't pretend to understand. The added pressure of needing to win for their school in order to generate revenue places a massive amount of stress on the teams and players. Though paying football players a percentage of total reve- nue similar to what NFL players get would be foolhardy, a little compen- sation for this burden isn't too much to ask for. This compensation, combined with the scholarship student-ath- letes are already receiving, could silence the college sports purists, as well as reduce the degree of exploi- tationthat many athletes feelthey're subject to. -Joe Sugiyama can be reached at jmsugi@umich.edu. 0 EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBERS: Aida Ali, Will Butler, Ellie Chessen, Michelle DeWitt, Ashley Griesshammer, Melanie Kruvelis' Patrick Maillet, Erika Mayer, Harsha Nahata, Emily Orley, Harsha Panduranga, Teddy Papes, Timothy Rabb, Asa Smith, Seth Soderborg, Andrew Weiner ROBBIE DEMBO I Takedisabilities survey FAHAD MUHAMMAD SAJID I The politics of scapegoating Do you have a disability? Do you have a friend who does? We are looking for students with chronic or mental health conditions, visible, invisible, auditory, visual or learning disabilities, or something totally different, to take our survey. Here's why: For the past several months, a group of pas- sionate student activists have been designing a study to document the experiences and per- spectives of students with disabilities. Our goal is to not only better understand how students with disabilities navigate University life, but to advocate for changes that will create a more accessible, equitable and welcoming campus community. We are appealing to all students with disabilities. Spend a few minutes taking our survey - share your story and together we can work to make the University a better place for students with disabilities. Our motivation has been guided primarily by the absence of data describing this signifi- cant demographic of students - those with disabilities. The University knows how many students are registered with the Services for Students with Disabilities - more than 1,400 - but it does not necessarily know or understand what their challenges and con- cerns are. Are students satisfied with the accommodations provided by the University? Is there a climate of tolerance and inclusion for people of different ability identities? Can students with disabilities easily navigate the University bureaucracy and access essential resources? Do students with disabilities feel comfortable "outing"' themselves to profes- sors and GSIs? How many students hide their disabilities for fear of stigma? These are just some of the questions we were asking, to which we could not find any clear answers. Through informal conversations and for- mal focus groups, we have begun to under- stand that while students with disabilities have unique and valid concerns, they aren't being asked for their feedback. And many students with sincere grievances have a dif- ficult time finding suitable recourse. We hope to change that. Our team, the Disability Affairs Commission of the Michigan Student Assembly, has created a survey to provide an outlet for students with disabilities to express their satisfaction, dissatisfaction or ambiva- lence. We hope to capture in our survey the ways in which the University is serving stu- dents with disabilities, as well as the ways it is failing them. But we know that in order to approach representatives of the University with any findings that describe what students with disabilities are thinking and feeling, we need to have a sufficient sample size. Put dif- ferently, in order to make an impact, in order to advocate for change, we need to show the University that students with disabilities demand to have their voices heard. Which is why we are appealing to you. Whether you openly identify as having a dis- ability or keep it to yourself, whether you are registered with SSD or not, whether you are satisfied with your experience or think things can be improved around campus, we hope that you will take a few minutes to complete our survey. With your anonymous responses, we will have the data necessary to identify and advocate for the specific changes that will most benefit students with disabilities. Make your voice heard by visiting http:// tiny.cc/DisabilitySurvey. Robbie Dembo is an LSA senior. He is a member of the Disability Affairs Committee of the Michigan Student Assembly. On April 16, 2007, in what turned out to be one of the deadliest shooting incidents by a lone gunman in the his- tory of the United States, Korean-born Seung-Hui Cho killed 32 people and wounded many others on the Vir- ginia Tech campus, taking his own life at the end of the rampage. When The Washington Post followed up with Cho's family after the incident, it was discovered that, fearing reprisals, they had gone into hiding, with an FBI agent and a lawyer serving as their only contact to the outside world. At the same-time, some Korean-American religious leaders called on their communities to partici- pate in a 32-day fast to repent for each death. But why should the onus of denouncing Cho's actions fall on the Korean-American community? In U.S. law there is no place for guilt by association, so the only per- son answerable for the acts of terror at Virginia Tech was Cho. Not his family. Not his community. Indeed, many Korean-Americans criticized the fasting proposal, arguing that it drew undue and irrelevant attention to the killer's ethnicity. And they were absolutely right. On March 10, 2011, Congressman Peter King (R-NY) launched the first of a series of hearings called "The Extent of Radicalization in the American Muslim Community and that Community's Response." Aptly described as a new McCarthyism and a modern day witch-hunt, King's hearings, hiding behind the fagade of national security, are aimed at making two misguided points: radicalization and violence are exclusively the domain of Muslims, and the entire Muslim community must bear the cross for the sins of a few truly rotten apples. And on both counts, he is dead wrong. Is it expected of Christians to publicly defend their moral uprightness every time a child molestation case involving a priest comes forward? Is it expected of Jews to distance themselves from the extremists whenever a Baruch Goldstein, who in a suicide mission in 1994 killed 29 praying Muslims and wounded 125 in Hebron, decides to forcefully reclaim parts of the Promised Land? The answer is an obvious and emphatic "no." You stand trial for your crimes and your crimes alone, and that is abasic and inviolable tenet of the law. The fact is, propensity to violence will continue to exist wherever there is an "us" and a "them." It cuts across identities of any and every sort and doesn't belong exclusively to the realm of religion. From the secular- Hindu Leninist-Marxist Tamil Tigers in Sri Lanka, who have committed more attacks than Hamas or Hezbollah, to Adolf Hitler, who, driven by nationalism and a sense of racial superiority, launched a war that would result in the deaths of at least 60 million people around the world, to former President Harry Truman and his decision to drop atomic bombs on Japanese cities only to signal America's post-WWII primacy to the USSR, the causes of violence abound and share no affinity with any one reason or group. Evil has no identity and is certainly not confined to any conceivable category. Moreover, every religious community has its idiots. There are those who will point to the Qur'an and argue that because the terrorists involved in whatever case said they were following the book, that's exactly what the book must say, and that all other Muslims must also believe in their twisted logic. Yet, the Ku Klux Klan, the largest and most vicious ter- rorist group in the history of the U.S., whose members lynched African Americans over an extended period of time, maintained that it was following the Bible. But does the KKK really represent Christianity? And must Christians apologize for its actions? So just as Anthony Hopkins, the Alabama preacher who killed his wife and stuffed her body in a freezer when she found him molesting a girl, does not repre- sent Christianity or Christians, and just as the Kach and Kahane Chai, the Jewish terrorist groups who want to see Arabs expelled and religious law imposed in Israel, do not represent Judaism or Jews, Major Nidal Hasan, who killed 13 and wounded 30 at the Fort Hood military base, does not speak for Islam and does not represent Muslims. He stood trial for his crimes and his alone, and no American-Muslim should feel the need to account or apologize for them. Congressman King's hearings point to dishonesty of the highest order and conjecture of a dangerous kind. By insinuating that violence starts and stops with Mus- lims (when accordingto the FBI, 94 percent of terrorist attacks on U.S. soil were committed by non-Muslims between 1980 and 2005) and that even the law-abiding ones must somehow be held responsible, he is destroy- ing the very fabric of this society and tearing to pieces the values that make this country great. These hear- ings are not only reprehensible and counter-produc- tive but also truly un-American, and must immediately be discontinued. Fahad Muhammad Sajid is an LSA senior. 0 0 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 a