Priorities at UMass

    I do not have time to be an investigative journalist.  I understand from book and television private eyes and reporters that the only way you find out anything is to keep bugging everybody until somebody tries to kill you.  Then you find out who has taken out a contract on your life and you are really getting somewhere in your investigation.  I don't have time for that.  All I can do is notice stupidity.

    For example, Chancellor Scott is talking about reducing the teaching staff of the University.

    The parking lot of Worcestor Dining Hall was torn out and replaced with a parking lot.  Chancellor Scott is talking about reducing the teaching staff of the University.

    A $30,000 parking lot would have been built next to Orchard Hill last semester but for some student dissent and cold weather.  Chancellor Scott is talking about reducing the teaching staff of the University.

    The steps of the Student Union were pulverized and rebuilt to look pretty much the same, except for the bushes on the pond side that were paved over.  Chancellor Scott is talking about reducing the teaching staff of the University.

    People with large machines spent over one day each working on every tree stump on campus: chipping it out and tracking its roots to the ends of the earth and destroying every single last one of them.  Chancellor Scott is talking about reducing the teaching staff of the University.

    A month was spent renovating the elevator in my building: it now has new flooring and stops every two seconds to chirp (it has to stop to chirp because chirping is not in an elevator's natural area of expertise).  Chancellor Scott is talking about reducing the teaching staff of the University.

    Employees at Health Services were unhappy so a fact-finding mission was commissioned.  A 44 page report revealed months later that employees at Health Services are unhappy.  Chancellor Scott is talking about reducing the teaching staff of the University.

    Money may be spent on cameras in the parking lots to record people who break into cars.  Chancellor Scott is talking about reducing the teaching staff of the University.

    To finish the sentence, Chancellor Scott is talking about reducing the number of professors and being a first-rate university at the same time.  It said so in the Collegian.  In a news article.  Chancellor Scott is talking about reducing the number of professors and being a first-rate university at the same time.  That doesn't happen.  There is a reason why all the best colleges want the first thing you know about them to be their low faculty to student ratio.  I don't know what UMass's faculty to student ratio is.  I’m not an investigative journalist.

    We are here to be taught by professors and not by teacher assistants who, no matter how wonderful or dedicated they are, do not have the time or the authority to put together a topnotch course.  All public education, from elementary school to (especially) the college level should be getting more money from the state and the United States.  The money UMass receives can still be spent better.  (How much money is spent on Chancellor Scott?  I don't know how to find this out.  I'm not an investigative journalist.)

    I would rather be in a school where every building is falling apart but the teaching staff is world-class than one with new steps and no tree stumps.  Tree stumps are nice to sit on anyhow.

    And putting up a building for the 'better for my education' Commonwealth College at the cost of keeping professors?  The part of my brain cell devoted to logic is causing an ear ache trying to escape through my left ear canal.  The Commonwealth College does not need a new building.  The University needs more professors.  The most educationally attractive aspect of the Honors Program concept is smaller classes.  I, for one, will volunteer the Dickinson fifth floor-east lounge if no other rooms on campus are forthcoming to teach a small class in.

    Some money coming to UMass is earmarked for the Commonwealth College.  Providing more small classes (for the Honors Program, but that anyone can take) is the way to spend this sum.  Assuming that each professor is already teaching the optimal number of classes, the only way to do this is to hire more professors.

    Will our University have enough teachers for us to learn from in the future?  I don't even know who (or what) actually makes the big decisions for this institution.  I'm not an investigative journalist.

    To Whom It May Concern: Please spend the available money on my education and not on parking lots.

    Ben Melançon is a UMass student and not an investigative journalist.

[The Massachusetts Daily Collegian published this article 1999 February 2, a Tuesday.  This version includes some changes made by then-Collegian editors Alexis Pushkar and Tanya Mannes.]

 

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