Category: Opinion

Last month I had the opportunity to go to a forum where police and students discussed what might have gone wrong this past Halloween. For the third straight year, Halloween ended with a riot on State Street. I went because I was curious whether students and police could see that they both could have handled themselves better. That didn�t happen. Those who were pepper sprayed were convinced that they shouldn�t have been, and the police were sure, with few exceptions, which were layered with qualifiers, that they handled themselves correctly.

Over the past few years, UW students have seen their tuition increase at unprecedented rates. In the face of drastic budget cuts that originate in the statehouse, the university has been forced to continually demand more money from students while offering fewer, more crowded classes. A fourth-year in-state student now pays $2,933.12 per semester-a 64.4 percent increase from a semester’s tuition when he or she entered the university in the fall of 2001.

I’ve been hanging around Madison for more than four years now and writing for The Daily Cardinal for several of them. In my last column for the Cardinal and I just wanted to make an observation and talk about a few of the issues I am passionate about.

As the end of the semester is approaching and finals are looming in the not-too-distant future, I can’t help but feel a little nervous. Last semester after finals were over and I was eagerly checking my grades, I was horrified to discover I had received a D in one of my classes. Having had an AB in the class going into the final I was in total shock.

Daily Cardinal staff opinion:
For all its advantages, the UW-Madison campus is not very diverse. The administration has made attempts to devise programs to attract students of different backgrounds and lifestyles to UW System campuses. The fact remains, however, that most students here are middle class white people.

Last summer, the Wisconsin Legislature was mulling over a proposal for a Taxpayer Bill of Rights. TABOR is a Republican-led initiative intended to constrain state spending through the adoption of a constitutional amendment. TABOR stems from the aspiration for fewer and lower taxes, but it is a drastic proposal that spares no consideration for those reliant upon state services. The proposed TABOR would strip the UW System down to its bare bones and force UW-Madison to become a private university.

We are firm believers in the method of consistent reminding. One rally, one article and one protest are not enough to send a message. The student body must continue their plea for help.

University of Wisconsin students are stuck with a hefty tuition bill every semester. Students must pay their bill in one large chunk whether it be through financial aid, hard-earned cash or gracious parental assistance.

“But can she still wear a toga?” You bet I can – even though I went through four years of college without drinking a single drop of alcohol, says Kathryn Audie Sturino who graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 2003 and now lives in New York.

“The Vietnam War was raging in the summer of 1968 when I heard that one of my high school classmates had returned from Saigon in a body bag. I didn’t know him that well, but the horrible news brought the war much closer to home.”

Administrators at American universities have one more thing to worry about.