Behind The Eight Ball

A brief history of the "activist" administration of Bill Miner and Ben Unger.

They kicked off Fall term by placing urinal screens with the slogan "You have the power to stop rape in your hand" in men's rooms around campus and throughout the Greek system. UO Housing tentatively OKed placement of the urinal screens in residence halls but ultimately balked. The project drew more derisive remarks (many on bathroom walls) and criticism than praise and, despite Miner's assertion that he was satisfied "just to get people talking" about rape, the whole thing ground to a rather ignominious end after the screens were removed and everybody forgot about the controversy.

Miner and Unger did score a minor victory with their professor evaluation booklets. It's a good idea: students are provided with a catalog of the results of the questionnaires University professors are required to present to students at the end of every term. Theoretically the booklets will allow students to make more informed choices when picking classes and make professors more responsible to their customers. Unfortunately, the efficacy of the booklets turned out to be low. State law only allows the booklets to make use of two of the most general questions, eliminating the most useful information on how well a professors performs. In addition, it has been an uphill battle to get the Administration to include the professor evaluation booklet in the course catalog--where it would be most beneficial to students--and to have the University take over the cost of printing the booklet--something the ASUO cannot afford.

Miner and Unger have been stalled to an even greater degree in other attempts to effectuate change. Their proposed extension of the course Add/Drop period was defeated by the faculty-dominated University Senate and apparently has since languished at the bottom of the Executive's priority list.

Centering mainly on Nike CEO and UO alumnus Phil Knight, Vice-President Unger in particular has attacked the University for not only accepting money made by alleged exploitation of Third-World labor but in the process becoming beholden to corporate entities more concerned with the bottom line than quality education.

However, apart from speaking out against a proposed "donor wall" to commemorate major contributors to the University's endowment fund as well as a $30,000 donation from Knight earmarked directly for boosting University President Dave Frohnmayer's salary, little has come from the ASUO Executive's plan to clean up the UO's donation acceptance policy.

While Frohnmayer did eventually refuse to accept the money, the pressure that caused him to decline the endowment came from the state-wide higher education community and citizens at large, not exclusively the office of Miner and Unger. In addition, the $30,000 in question merely went back into general endowments for the school--not back to Phil Knight's checking account, where some critics felt it belonged.

As for the donor wall, the EMU's lethargic reaction to the proposal most likely stems from the EMU Board's current predicament in keeping the renovations on schedule as well as its scramble for money to pay for current improvements and city-and-state-mandated equipment upgrades to make the student union building fire code and Americans with Disabilities Act compliant.

Add to this student groups complaining that the EMU Board is not making good on promises to refurbish office space to augment current availability and quality of student programming and it seems doubtful that a tribute to donors would be a top priority for the EMU Board regardless of the stance of the Executive office. It probably doesn't help that chief protester Unger often wears Nike sneakers to meetings, either.

It also seems that in the process of trying to be as "progressive" as possible during their tenure, Miner and Unger have damaged their working relationships and reputations with several parts of the University community. President Frohnmayer sounds increasingly petulant in his vehement denials that their is any wrong doing, conflict of interest or shady dealings when it comes to big money donations. Frohnmayer's obvious frustration stems mainly from the fact that Miner, Unger and their bandwagon constantly ask him the same question about the UO's finances, often with the implication that Frohnmayer and the Administration have been less than honest with students.

In much the same vein, the Executive attacked the University Senate, again implying, both at Senate meetings and in Emerald articles, that the University faculty had it's own interests in mind when it denied the extension of the Add/Drop period.

All this has lead to grumblings from several sectors of campus that Miner and Unger are better at laying blame than working with people. The University Senate has largely been alienated, and the general feeling on campus is that this year's Executive often says one thing, then tries to do another and cries foul on someone else if a plan doesn't work out to their satisfaction.

And itís not just Administration and faculty who grouse about the Miner/Unger way of doing things. Recently there seem to be misgivings within the ASUO itself about how the Miner and Unger run things. The failure of the Executive to come out with a prompt, decisive stance--or really any stance at all--regarding the increasingly controversial case of alleged sex offender and student Donta Graham-Preston angered students both as groups and individuals. After months of ill-will surrounding the prolonged set of hearings and subsequent appeals by Graham-Preston, the Executive finally came out in support of the University-based judicial system that found Graham-Preston in violation of the Student Conduct Code and suspended him for two years.

This is not exactly the performance many expected from the current Executive. As much as Unger has characterized himself as an anti-corporate influence activist, Miner has characterized himself as a women's-issues activist. Miner, who considers himself a feminist, did not act as quickly as many students felt he should have in adding Executive support to the campus judicial systemís findings.

The evidence that students are upset with Miner and Unger, if only in terms of the Graham-Preston case, came in the form of angry posters plastered all over campus in a fit of activism-cum-civil disobedience that Miner and Unger could well learn from. Placed on buildings from PLC to the EMU, with many directly outside the glass-walled Suite 4, which houses the Executive office, were posters asking "Where is campus support of rape victims?" and proclaiming "Miner/Unger we are watching you." Many of the posters were immediately taken down, although two posters remain pasted to a pair of columns outside of Suite 4, perhaps as reminder from Miner and Unger to themselves that they work for students and, though it's often not evident, students are watching.

At this point, it seems that student outrage has lit a fire underneath Miner and Unger. At the Feburary 4th Student Senate meeting, Unger announced a vigil in support of both the alleged victims of Graham-Preston and the Student Conduct Code; Miner was out postering for the event that same night. Coming a little over a day before they planned to hold the vigil (9 a.m. Friday the 6th), what it amounted to was a hastily thrown together effort to save face. In the end, though, it doesn't matter if they're actually learning the lessons, as long as they act like they're learning the lessons.

Andrew Oberriter, a senior majoring in English is Editor Emeritus for the Oregon Commentator