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If you were looking for a copy of the Skiff Tuesday, chances are you couldn't find one. That's because some person or group of people took them. Between 9 and 11 a.m., nearly all 4,600 copies of Tuesday's paper disappeared from distribution boxes across campus. Yes, we are upset. However, our biggest concern is you, our readers. As a staff, we are committed to providing our readers with the best, most accurate news coverage available regarding our campus, community and world. Our goals are now and have always been to inform, to educate, to serve, to guide and to teach. Tuesday's incident almost prevented us from meeting these goals. As part of Tuesday's paper, we devoted an eight-page guide titled, "Student Government Association Elections 1999 Voter's Guide," which provided candidate profiles and editorial staff endorsements for today's SGA online elections. With all the complaints about student apathy, our goals were to inform readers and encourage participation in the student body elections. With the effort to make voting easier and more convenient for students, you have until midnight to vote online at (www.e-lection.com). The students who are elected will be some of the leaders who represent our campus to incoming students, and they play an integral role in decisions that directly affect our campus and university policies. To not vote would only perpetuate the idea that we are an apathetic and uneducated student body incapable of making decisions that affect the future of our university. By taking the newspapers, more attention was drawn to Tuesday's issue than would have been if they were left alone. If you disagree with what we print, write a letter to the editor. Don't steal the paper.
Profs, look beyond deadlines Surely she can't expect me to turn in my paper if I'm on life support. That was the thought running through my head as I drove home from work last week. I had a paper due the next day and because of my hectic work schedule, I had no time to write it. As I drove along, my mind was occupied in coming up with things I could tell my professor that would buy me more time. Maybe I can tell her I'm sick. Maybe I can say my cat died. Excuse after excuse ran through my head, but I knew they were all weak at best. What's more, they were all lies. I was growing depressed and was almost resigned to getting a zero when it finally hit me. You can't write a paper if you're in the hospital! From that moment until I disappointedly arrived home safely, I was hoping to get into a car accident. If this sounds sick, that's probably because it is. If it sounds familiar, then you, like me, are insane. You are insane and trying hard not to buckle under the brutal demands of college life. The term "college life" is largely misunderstood. The life of a student is not simply about going to class and studying. It's about working to try to stay in school only to find that the demands of your job are putting you in danger of flunking out. It's about stress over family problems, boyfriends and girlfriends (or the lack thereof), and plans for the future. In effect, it's not simply about college but it's about life as well. It seems, however, that many professors do not understand this. It's as if they think students do not have a life beyond the classroom. Some even seem to think that students do not have a life outside of their classroom. These are the professors who assign a week's worth of reading for one night, disregarding the fact that most students have at least three other classes to study for. They are the ones who are completely inflexible about deadlines even under the most trying circumstances. These professors, after being told by a student that they can't turn in their paper because they were in traction over the weekend, look the student in the eye and tell them that if they began working on the paper when it was first assigned, they wouldn't be in such a mess. This kind of professor may seem extreme, but they are not altogether uncommon. I've actually had one my professors tell the class, "In order to reschedule an exam you must either be near death or have experienced the loss of someone in your family, not an aunt or an uncle, but your immediate family." With this kind of pressure, it's no wonder that many students contemplate dropping out. Yes, college should be challenging. Long nights and hectic days are to be expected sometimes. But college should not be a threat to your nervous system. Students should not leave universities with degrees, ulcers and migraines. Now I'm just sure there's some neurotic professor thinking, "If I allow one person to reschedule an exam then I'd have to let another. Soon the whole class would want to reschedule and then the whole campus. It'd be total anarchy!" But I'm not suggesting that professors let students turn in papers or take exams at their leisure. And I'm not suggesting that professors reduce the amount of the work load for their classes. What I am suggesting is that professors show compassion and understanding. I'm asking that they realize that there are some things in my life that I cannot control, that I have emotional ups and downs, and that I need sleep. As for students, I have one piece of advice when the pressure just gets to be too much: Don't do it. If it's 4 a.m., you have a paper due and you haven't slept for two days, don't do it. If it's three hours before a test, you can't keep your eyes open and you still haven't studied, don't do it. An "A" paper turned in late and marked down a grade is better than a "D" paper turned in on time. And a test isn't worth taking if you fall asleep during it. This may not be the right course of action in all cases, but I'm finding that when I'm panicky at 3 a.m. and on the verge of tears, it's better to go to sleep than to stay up chanting, "I'm gonna fail." As for my paper story, it did end happily. I told my teacher the truth, and she let me turn it in later. I won't reveal her name but I'd like to say thank you to the little blonde with the big dog. Thank you for understanding that I'm not just a student. I'm a person, too.
Shavahn Dorris is a junior English major from Joliet, Ill. She can be reached at (msvon19@aol.com). Avoid embarrassment; mind your manners during meals While dining recently with a high-ranking campus official and a group of student leaders, I was amazed (or perhaps the word is appalled) at how many of the students at the table did not know either know or choose to use basic etiquette. I understand that most college students don't need to know the protocol for eating with the president, but we should probably know the basics of eating outside of a barn. Hopefully, most TCU students will be wanting to secure employment upon graduation. Many times, this involves an interview over dinner or lunch, and I have heard of people who did not get hired because they did not use their manners at the table. What a waste of a college education to not get a good job because you chewed with your mouth open. There is certainly a time and a place for everything, and I know that you probably are not going to have a 10-piece place setting at The Main. One does not necessarily have to always use proper etiquette, but one does need to have knowledge of it and when it should be used. This is to avoid looking stuffy while eating with your friends at Whataburger at 3 a.m. on a Friday, but you also avoid making an ass of yourself when dining with a potential employer, a campus official or your grandmother. So here are a few of the hard-and-fast rules that will make it easier for you to appear polite and well-bred in any situation. You may not actually be these things, but you have a better chance of fooling the people you are with. 1. After sitting down at a table, put your napkin in your lap. Never set it on the table again. No one wants to look at food that has been transferred from your mouth to your napkin. If you must leave the table, fold your napkin and neatly place it on the seat of your chair. 2. Don't salt and pepper your food before you try it. This makes you appear to make rash decisions and is an insult to the chef. Also, salt and pepper are friends, and they don't like to be apart. If someone asks you to pass the salt, pass both. And while we are talking about passing, it should be done hand to table, not hand to hand. 3. If you want to butter your bread, transfer the butter from the butter plate with the butter knife to your own bread plate. Then break off a bite-sized piece of bread and butter it with your own knife. Not the community one. 4. Don't stab your food with the tines of your fork. This is difficult. But then, so is life. Get used to it. 5. If eating pasta, don't use a pasta spoon. It is in poor taste. Place the tines of your fork in the middle of the pasta and twirl. Even though restaurants may bring you a pasta spoon, remember that restaurants are not great Meccas of proper etiquette. 6. Don't cut up all of your meat at once. Cut one bite at a time. Then place your knife, blade towards you, at the top of your plate. 7. Here's a tricky one. Let's say you take a big bite of food, and it turns out to be a big gelatinous glob of fat or another foreign matter that you just can't stomach. Do not spit it out into your napkin. Discreetly raise your fork back to your mouth and delicately spit the food back out into your fork. Then place it on your plate. Do not share your disgust with the rest of the table. If you are at a restaurant and you find something gross in your food like a fingernail, a hair or, God forbid, a roach, discreetly ask your waiter to bring you a new dish. This is not the time to stand up and shout, "Hail Mary, there's a bug in my chef salad!" Other diners do not want their meal ruined, even if yours already is. 8. Do not chew with your mouth open, talk with your mouth full or slurp your food. Do not talk about what the food is made of. Also, if you are a vegetarian, good for you. However, this is not the time to be telling people eating a big steak that they are killing helpless little cows. Basically, try to remember what your mom taught you. When in doubt watch what your host is doing, buy an etiquette book or just never leave the confines of your own home. Just make sure that you don't disgust the people that you are eating with. That is not a good way to win friends and influence people.
Kim Hinkle is a senior advertising and public relations major from Overland Park, Kan. She can be reached at (parottthed@aol.com). Devastating truth of anorexia ignored for quest for beauty "You know, sometimes I wish I was anorexic." The words echoed in my ears as I cringed and my stomach turned. I slowly turned around to catch a glimpse at the girl who just made a comment that made my throat dry up and my head spin with unpleasant memories of a past I have tried to forget. "I'm serious. I mean, those girls have so much self-control. I'm envious," continued the girl seated at the table behind me. Her friend nodded in agreement between spoonfuls of ice cream. My fingers gripped the edge of my chair tightly and my face flushed. I forced myself to swallow the mouthful of Diet Pepsi I almost spit out 20 seconds earlier. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. "Lisa? Hey, what's wrong?" I heard my friend ask from across the table. I forced myself to smile. "Oh, it's nothing. Nothing at all," I replied, turning my attention back to my lunch. Unfortunately, something is wrong. Something is drastically wrong with our society when women actually envy a potentially life-threatening disorder. All too often, I hear women make comments similar to the ones I heard last week in the dining hall. Sure, some of us look at Calista Flockhart's skeletal back and Courtney Cox's prominent collarbones with disgust, but those same figures grace the covers of magazines we buy and star in the television programs we watch. The same magazines that feature "horror stories" of anorexia continue to publish the latest diet and fitness trends and highlight a glamorous, waif-like Kate Moss modeling a leather tube-top that displays her rib cage. Our society considers anorexia to be attractive and glamorous. Why else are individuals complimented on their weight loss? Why would a size zero even exist? Why would I hear my little sister's 14-year-old friends talk about how "fat" they are while they discuss their new liquid diets they hope will make them look like the skinny actresses on "Dawson's Creek"? Well, here's a news flash: There is nothing glamorous about an eating disorder. There is nothing glamorous about stepping on the scale 10, 20 or 30 times a day to measure your worth by the numbers you see. There is nothing glamorous about sneaking out of the house before dawn to run 10 miles before school. There is nothing glamorous about lying to your mother at every meal, making excuses for why you aren't hungry and hiding your meal in your napkin. There is nothing glamorous about fidgeting in a desperate attempt to burn off extra calories from a sugar-free Lifesaver. There is nothing glamorous about pushing away your friends and loved ones because anorexia has become your new best friend. There is nothing attractive about counting your ribs, about lying on the bathroom floor, sobbing in pain and coughing up the vomit that remains in your mouth after you purge yourself of a rice cake. There is nothing glamorous about looking at your rib cage, bony knees and protruding hipbones and only seeing fat. There is nothing glamorous about criticizing yourself hundreds of times, pinching yourself and crying at the image laughing back at you from the mirror. Most of all, there is nothing glamorous about your life when it is consumed by nothing but self-hatred. Make the most of your life, for it is too short to count calories, weigh yourself and furiously exercise. Measure your success by the work you do and the people you touch rather than the size of your jeans. If, at the end of the day, you can look in the mirror and smile contently, then you've succeeded. And that is what should be considered glamorous.
Lisa Mareb is a columnist for The Post at Ohio University. This column came from U-WIRE. |
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