COLUMN: Apathy or responsibility?

From Michael Mugmon's, "The Way It Is," Fall '98 From Michael Mugmon's, "The Way It Is," Fall '98If Penn drops $300 million on the table and almost 10,000 undergraduates are around to hear it, does it make a sound? For the second time in as many years, University administrators have decided to plunk down a sizable chunk of change on a massive project without having yet specified their exact sources of funding. And for the second time in as many years, most University undergraduates haven't uttered a questioning peep about their school's spending spree. As the first of the two major construction initiatives, Sansom Common was Executive Vice President John Fry's baby, replacing a parking lot across from the Annenberg School for Communication. Although an early success on all counts, the $120 million Yber-structure at 36th and Walnut streets went through a dubious refinancing this summer just as the Penn Bookstore opened for business. Last week, Penn officials unveiled the second costly project -- a wide-scale plan to renovate every college house and dining facility. They're even throwing in a new Hamilton Village dorm. Price tag: $300 million. Where will the money come from? Administrators hope they can snare some donations, but no one knows for certain. When you consider that the shaky world economy caused the University to lose 10 percent of its $3 billion endowment at the end of August, and when you consider that the formerly mega-profitable University of Pennsylvania Health System hemorrhages buckets of cash by the day, ambitious and expensive undertakings should naturally seem suspect. But why don't most Penn students ask, for example, why their money might fund a new campus hotel instead of new buildings for the Music and Psychology departments? Why don't they care how their money (or, in many cases, their parents' money) gets spent? Why do Penn students choose to remain ignorant of the decisions and actions made by University officials? What is responsible for the collective apathy here at Penn? Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe Penn students aren't apathetic. What if they simply express their glowing approval by their reticence? After all, silence equals consent, right? Probably not. Take last week's national midterm elections, for instance. Only 37 percent of the voting-age population headed to the polls. That paltry figure doesn't necessarily mean the American public approves of the job their leaders do. But it might mean that -- outside of taxes and postage stamps -- many American citizens don't feel affected by the daily machinery of government. In the grand scheme of things, a sordid presidential affair just doesn't compare with figuring out how to pay the rent. And perhaps Penn students have a similar attitude toward their school's sweeping initiatives. Regardless of whether the University overhauls a dining hall or a college house or a parking lot, these initiatives simply don't impact the goals and day-to-day lives of most students. First of all, most undergraduates stay in West Philadelphia for a mere four years. As a result, the "revolving door effect" produces only a limited interest in long-term projects. Besides expressing an allegiance to one's alma mater, what would motivate a student to care about a residential makeover that Penn wouldn't complete until 2007 -- five years after every current undergraduate will have earned a diploma? Also, admit it or not, Penn is a pre-professional environment to the core. Undergraduates don't want anything superfluous to infringe on scoring that sweet gig at Goldman Sachs or landing in the grad school of their dreams. Not surprisingly, students focus on what it takes to get there. They aim to get solid grades. (The more active folks actually enjoy some measure of learning.) They take the right classes. They get involved in the right extracurricular activities. (Again, the more active students take pride in what they do.) What many undergraduates fail to realize is that their career and academic goals do not necessarily preclude activism. In fact, those goals go hand in hand with student involvement and attention to broader University issues. How better to gear up for grad school than to learn how to comprehend and affect institutional change? How better to prepare for the so-called "real world" than to work with the administration on implementing a residential overhaul plan -- and possibly, as a few brave students have argued, saving Stouffer College House in the process? No matter how much I believe China should pull out of Tibet, students who bang drums in a circle on College Green -- though bucking the trend of apathy -- do little to draw attention or economic support to the Tibetans' plight. If they worked within the system, they could put whatever intellectual capital they have to much better use. But at least they're doing something. As one professor explained in a preceptorial, Penn will never be a hotbed of social upheaval on a Berkeley scale. But that doesn't mean students can't blend professionalism and responsibility. Activism means more than simply acting. It means applying your knowledge to what's going on around you.