Editorial

School Isn't About Students

The University has a field day with students' money and trust every year. Sadly, most students either donıt realize it, or don't know what to do about it.

The current grievance process, up for reform yet again, is a study in the administration pulling the wool over the eyes of students and drawing blurred lines between conflict of interest and different interests. The director of the office of affirmative action, Ken Lehrman, who is also an attorney, should know something about due process, but he senses no conflict of interest in the current system. As it stands, the review committee that determines whether there is a compelling interest for the University to legally pursue a discrimination complaint includes Pete Swan, the presidentıs legal advisor. While this is common practice at many institutions of higher learning, it represents a clear conflict of interest. Swan also prosecutes in the event that the complaint is acted upon.

The bottom line is clear: Everything said in confidence to this panel during its discovery process is potentially, albeit unethically, fair game for Swan. While the members of this board worry about the damaging effects of placing students on the board, none seem to harbor any qualms about having the prosecuting attorney privy to information given in confidence. Everything you say can, and most likely will, be used against you, no matter what confidentiality you think you have.

ASUO President Jen Williamson has spearheaded the effort to reform this process, by asking for students to be made part of the board, to remove the University's legal counsel from the board and replace him with an equally qualified law professor, and to make discrimination complaints a part of faculty's permanent file and a factor in hiring decisions.

In a similar instance of an institution intended to serve students turning around and screwing them, the EMU received another $47,000 from the EMU Board Finance Committee and the Student Senate. The EMU Committee voted unanimously for the increase, and the Student Senate had only three dissenting votes.

The EMU began the budget allocating session asking for only a five percent increase, but suggested that they might come back for the remaining money in the benchmark after all the budgets had been allocated by the Programs Finance Committee. All this in an effort to be fair. When the PFC came under benchmark, the EMU came back, asking for more. Even if the majority of this money goes to programming under the purview of the EMU, like Club Sports and the Cultural Forum, the EMU misled students and clearly believes that it is entitled to tax students as much as they please. Supported by ASUO Vice-President Zach Kelton, the EMU no doubt feels that the students were represented and that the system is dandy.

When Eric Bowen split up the Incidental Fee Committee to exclude the Athletic Department and the EMU from the purview of the Programs Finance Committee, he made a critical mistake. Turning the EMU Board over to the control of Dusty Miller is not unlike a public school board. The superintendent may answer to the board, but the superintendent is the direct line for information to the board. Thus, the board is dependent on the superintendent for the decision-making criteria.

Clearly, Dusty Miller doesn't care much about providing necessary services at low cost to students. But the EMU Board and Kelton seem to be led to believe otherwise, no doubt by Miller himself.

The grievance process and the EMU's penetration of incidental fee coffers have two things in common: The administrators see no conflict of interest where it clearly exists, and they donıt care.