Category: Opinion

The state Senate recently passed a bill enabling UW System faculty and academic staff to unionize and attempt to gain benefits through collective bargaining.

The cute girl in the YouTube video has a crush on Obama.
I know how she feels. I ‘ve had a crush on Bill Clinton.

I already know all the reasons why this is stupid.

In fact, I saw one of those reasons standing in line, waiting to get into the Stock Pavilion on the UW-Madison campus.

SO THERE is this new novel that’s getting picked up by book clubs out in the Pacific Northwest but hardly anybody in Madison, where the author lives, even knows he wrote a book.

Somebody needs to remind Casey Nagy what the celebrated writer/journalist Jimmy Breslin once said: “If you do not blow your own horn, there is no music.”

“I’m not a self-promoter,” Nagy was saying Friday.

Since it began in 1996, the event has raised more than $200,000 to support the work of the UW-Madison Habitat for Humanity chapter.

The death of 22-year-old UW-Whitewater student Kelly Nolan was one of the top stories of 2007 to make headlines in the city of Madison. Police revealed that Nolan disappeared one night when friends left her bar hopping on State Street in June 2007. After two weeks of searching, Nolanâ??s body was found in the town of Dunn, Wis.

Many are roommates, although they work divergent day jobs. Dorfman is a clergy assistant at a synagogue, Gronli works for “The Colbert Report, ” Johnson is working on a yet-to-be-announced project for UW-Madison alum Ben Karlin ‘s production company, Gramstrup is in real estate, Klipstein does graphic design and Beiler is a video producer for the New York Times.

NOW THAT Paul Buhle has returned to Madison, it makes sense that he’s embarked on a new book project titled “Return to Madison,” about more of which in a moment.

First, it should be noted that this is a big day for Buhle, whom my Capital Times colleague John Nichols has called “the pre-eminent scholar of American radicalism” and who for many years has been on the faculty of Brown University in Providence, R.I.

Today is the official publication date of “Students for a Democratic Society: A Graphic History.” Buhle edited the new book, and more than that, 40 years ago, he lived it, as a member of SDS on campuses in Champaign, Ill., and Madison.

I’ve been writing for daily newspapers since I joined the staff of The Daily Cardinal at UW-Madison in 1960. That’s pushing close to a half-century, but who’s counting?

A recent article from The Associated Press cited concerns of University of Wisconsin faculty and administration alike over the state’s pay plan for UW faculty and academic staff. The plan results in a pay reduction when viewed in “real dollars.”

This has raised concerns among many people in the UW community about UW’s ability to stay competitive with peer institutions. It’s no secret that the UW System is facing a crisis in faculty retention. UW-Madison, for example, has a 57 percent success rate in retaining faculty who had received an outside offer, a significant drop from the previous six-year average of 75 percent retained.

I HATE to do this. I mean, I really hate to do this. But in the interest of fairness, I must.

It appears there is a possibility — I stress, a possibility — that there has been a breakthrough in one of the most confounding mysteries of our time.

What ought we do about how badly poor children lag in school?

I can tell you what Annemarie Ketterhagen is doing. She’s helping run a new school at 12th and Garfield.

Ketterhagen, who grew up in the ‘burbs, says she long wanted to be in education. She went off to Madison and got a University of Wisconsin education degree. Then a friend changed her life by going to a Teach for America recruiting talk.

Madison, Wis. – Ask the average Wisconsin citizen how the University of Wisconsin-Madison touches his or her life, and you’re likely to hear something about Badger football, perhaps a mention of the UW Hospital, and maybe a gripe about nephew Steve being turned down for admission even though he posted a 3.8 grade point average in high school.

During his tenure as chancellor of Wisconsin’s flagship public campus, John Wiley has done what he could to expand the list of commonly held (and positive) UW-Madison perceptions. He hasn’t always been successful, but he will leave a solid foundation for his successor when he retires in September 2008.

What we need to do as a university and a community is quit the posturing and rhetoric. Quit the debating about the necessity of diversity education programs or positions promoting diversity and campus climate. Quit focusing too much on recruitment and start focusing on retention. We need to quit talking, quit stalling and Just Bust.

When I was a struggling junior faculty member, every publication mattered so much that rejection letters felt like physical blows. And it wasnâ??t only the brute fact of the rejections that caused pain: Readersâ?? reports on my manuscripts were often written in a tone of sharp annoyance. Touchy and ill-tempered, they seemed to see only the flaws. It was as if Iâ??d somehow insulted these readers, breaking rules that I didnâ??t know existed. Thereâ??s no question that Iâ??ve had much to learn about framing, pursuing, and clinching an argument. But Iâ??ve certainly never had any intention of irritating my readers.

Caroline Levine is a professor of English at the University of Wisconsin at Madison.

The news media have presented Iraq and the war on terror as a disaster. As an American civilian and a soldier twice deployed in this conflict, I see it as an opportunity. Capt. James Pickart, a Madison native and graduate of UW-Madison, is a captain in the U.S. Army Reserves and a veterinarian in Fairplay, Colo.