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(09/24/99 9:00am)
Career Services' problems are instructive for other penn departments looking to implement new technology. Career Services' problems are instructive for other penn departments looking to implement new technology.If there is one certainty in this electronic age, it is that new systems crash, early and often. Unfortunately, Career Services seems to have been ill-prepared for the possibility of a crash. Instead, because no back-up system was in place, Career Services has been forced to rely series of extensions and a return to dropping resumes off the old-fashioned way -- by hand at the office -- to ensure that students are not punished in the long term for the system's failures. But over the summer, vendor Crimson Solutions made several changes to the program -- changes Patricia Rose, the director of Career Services, believes have caused the current spate of problems. At the very least, the possibility that such problems could arise should have been apparent. Career Services' own history should also have served as a warning beacon: the 1998 roll-out of Fortune -- the in-house system used by students to schedule interviews and get career information -- was also plagued in early use by a host of bugs and crashes. The lesson here is simple: even the most beneficial of technologies will not work perfectly from day one. That is no reason to shy away from new technologies, but it is more than ample reason to ensure that a system works before becoming totally reliant on its services. It is a lesson we hope both Career Services and other Penn departments will heed in the future.
(09/16/99 9:00am)
The Associated Press WASHINGTON -- The Democratic National Committee, hoping to energize its fundraising operation to counter Republican presidential front-runner George W. Bush, plans to shuffle its leadership to give Philadelphia Mayor Ed Rendell a top post. Romer confirmed his departure in a telephone interview. ''I'm going to move over to be the general chair of the convention committee,'' Romer said. "The reason for that is this convention is going to become the main focus of our ability to communicate the message in the months ahead." ''I came here to do message, to be a spokesman for the party. This is the most effective way to continue in that role,'' he said. A formal announcement of Romer's new position was planned for today, the first day of a three-day DNC meeting in Washington, officials said. Clinton was also expected to recommend Rendell's appointment to the full DNC, officials said. Several Democrats said Romer agreed to the change after it became clear that Clinton and Vice President Al Gore wanted him to focus on fund-raising. The shift reflects a mounting concern about Bush, the Texas governor who has raised more than $50 million -- perhaps twice as much as Gore. Gore is the leading Democratic candidate, though he faces a stiff challenge from former New Jersey Senator Bill Bradley. Joe Andrew, national chairperson of the DNC, is in charge of day-to-day operations of the party. He will not be immediately affected by the change, officials said. Though Rendell has limited national political experience, Gore has called him a ''fantastic mayor.'' Advisers say the vice president was impressed with Rendell's successful effort to court the 2000 Republican National Convention to his city. Rendell also chaired a Gore fund-raiser in June that collected $450,000.
(04/01/99 10:00am)
From Nadia Dowshen's, "Urban Guerrilla," Fall '99 From Nadia Dowshen's, "Urban Guerrilla," Fall '99Living across the street from a mental health facility at 40th and Pine has drastically increased my awareness of mental illness. Every morning, I walk by the same gray-haired woman asking me for a quarter or a cigarette and then pass her on the way home as she screams incomprehensibly to someone that I cannot see. I often worry that she, like so many people with biologically based brain illnesses, will end up in jail or homeless. Not only are the mentally ill ending up homeless but many are incarcerated, costing taxpayers billions of dollars annually and leading to inhumane treatment. In California alone, the government spends over $1.5 billion annually on corrections, law enforcement and court costs for the mentally ill. Clinical studies suggest that 6 to 15 percent of persons in city and county jails and 10 to 15 percent of people in state prisons have a severe mental illness. And a greater portion of mentally ill people are arrested and incarcerated than in the general population. Once incarcerated, prisons fail to meet the special needs of mentally ill inmates. Ninety-five percent of the mentally ill persons who are incarcerated were receiving no treatment at the time of their arrest. In jail, rules and policies are focused on punishment rather than rehabilitation. Few prison guards receive special training to deal with mentally ill inmates and consequently do not know how to respond to inmates who are incapable of comprehending and following the rules because of mental illness. As a result, many mentally ill inmates find themselves in solitary confinement. Also, it may take weeks for a mentally ill inmate to see a psychiatrist, during which time their medication is typically discontinued. These kinds of conditions can make mental illness substantially worse for many inmates. And incarceration may have even more deleterious effects on young mentally ill persons, who are estimated to comprise over 20 percent of juveniles in prison. So why are so many of our nation's mentally ill falling through the cracks? Some blame the failure of deinstitutionalization at the state level, pointing to the 79 percent decline in the population of mental hospitals, primarily triggered by the creation of federal funding for community mental health centers in 1963. The discovery of anti-psychotic drugs facilitated the shift to community-based mental health services and increased concern over the comparatively inhumane conditions at state mental hospitals. Due to the lack of funding, jails have become the primary institutions open 24 hours to those who are both mentally ill and poor. People with mental illnesses deserve treatment, not punishment and life on the streets. Mentally ill people need comprehensive, coordinated services and they need to be treated with dignity and respect.
(03/17/99 10:00am)
A court decision ending the NCAA's existing academic eligibility standard may do more harm than good. Yesterday, a federal court judge denied an NCAA request to stay the invalidation of the existing eligibility statute while the NCAA appealed the invalidation. The ruling set the stage for a chaos. With only a month remaining before the signing date for several collegiate sports, including basketball and football, schools are, for the moment, free to play the recruiting game by their own rules. The train of events was set in motion two weeks ago, when federal circuit Judge Ronald Buckwalter invalidated Proposition 16 -- the NCAA's now-expired eligibility standard -- on the grounds that it unfairly discriminated against minorities in its emphasis on SAT scores. Accept, for the moment, that Proposition 16 illegally discriminated against minorities by placing too great an emphasis on SAT scores. Also, accept that as such, each day the law remains on the books represents a continued injustice. Even so, Buckwalter is creating a greater injustice in his attempt to instantly end a smaller one. In other words, the ruling means that schools may face the irresistible temptation of taking the "student" out of "student-athlete." The message that would send to high school athletes struggling academically is troubling. Fortified with the knowledge that academic achievement will not play a role in their ability to secure an athletic scholarship, what will keep such students in class? Worse still, what will motivate future students to focus on academic achievements when the gates of higher learning stand open to those who can dunk, illiterate or no. Both sides in the case profess to recognize these issues, and both acknowledge that the NCAA must work to develop a new set of uniform standards for its member institutions. We agree, and hope that a stay is granted on appeal. But regardless, the NCAA must act quickly to implement an adjusted eligibility standard as soon as possible. Ultimately, nothing is more important than ensuring minimum academic standards are in place.
(04/08/98 9:00am)
In my first year of middle school I learned that boys pull girls' pigtails. In my first year of high school I learned that women won equality in the 1970s. In my first year of college I learned that my history teacher had lied and that boys still misbehave. I do not understand how any Penn student can claim that gender inequalities on the college campus or in our larger society have been eradicated. We have made vast progress in the larger battles for political and economic rights, yet young women in America still face daily abuses specific to the female gender. This continued battery is especially damaging because it is subtle. We are constantly bombarded by peers and the media to conform to a double standard of beauty: be sexy, but not sluttish; be thin, but not bony; wear black pants, but don't personify the sorority type. Female Wharton graduates can look forward to a businessworld where they will have to fight to earn equal pay for equal work. We are subjected to the torments of males who, seeing us as breasts and genitalia, belittle us through dormroom banter, poor taste but mainstream films and e-mail circulated sex jokes. It's not that we can't take a joke, but it's tiring to be the punchline time and again. I'm the first to assert that not all men are guilty of these offenses; my aim is not to perpetuate stereotypes. But what conclusion are we to come to when repeated experience reinforces these stereotypes? Women at frat parties do find themselves fending off roaming fingers; women in the big city do get accosted; women in the office do become the unhappy recipients of unwanted advances. In the regular course of events, we don't complain about being treated disrespectfully because we have been conditioned to view the swirl of sexual jibes and snide comments as a natural mode of rapport between males and females. I take full responsibility for the fact that I rarely protest these degradations anymore. Somewhere along the line I learned that a little woman in a big world can lose her voice easily, so it's best not to shout. But even as the Penn Women's Center celebrates its 25th Anniversary, reading the public commentary that has lined this newspaper's pages has convinced me that my silence is the surest way to reinforce the status quo. So today I add my voice to the males and females alike who look forward to a more equal society where men and women respect each other as intelligent equals, not sex objects. As the cream of the country's academic crop and its future leaders, it is our duty to continue to strive for gender equality and our special shame if we deny that the problem persists. When I don't need a posse of trustworthy male friends to escort me to a party, when I don't see girls tragically parading their anorexic frames around campus, when I can live through an entire day without being teased by a male student who thinks I find humor in his sexual innuendo, when the card swiper learns my name is not "sweetheart," when I can voice my opinions without being called a bitch, then and only then will I applaud those who declare that the revolution is over. I can only hope it happens before my daughter is old enough to have pigtails.
(04/03/96 10:00am)
To the Editor: Punitive measures may be just, but can only do so much to deter crime and they do not undo crimes that have been committed. Locking people away may prevent them from engaging in further criminal activity, but imprisonment comes with costs, financial as well as social. Furthermore, the power of stiff punishment to deter future criminal behavior in others is questionable and the subject of vigorous debate. Thus, while the punishment of those found responsible for the killing may indeed be some form of justice, it is equally important to attend to the underlying factors that lead to crime. Editorial statements such as "random violence" and the assertion that kids who get bored "go out with a gun, searching for a student to hold up for fun" speak to a lack of deeper consideration of both sides of the issue -- consideration that is urgently needed to deal effectively with crime. Despite the great misfortune of an individual being singled out and victimized and the bravado that often accompanies aggressive behavior, crime is not just random or for fun. It doesn't "just happen," but comes about for specific reasons, often having to do with the material and emotional needs of people who are alienated from mainstream society. Root causes of juvenile crime, such as the social isolation and lack of supportive guidance that characterizes the experience of many youngsters in our urban communities -- combined with the widespread availability of guns -- need to be addressed. The challenge is ultimately for people to work together with compassion and understanding and without the blinding divisiveness of an "us versus them" mentality, to truly address social problems and bring about a safer and more fulfilling way of life for all. Mori Insinger Sociology Graduate Student Closing was common sense To the Editor: With typical melodrama, Sonja Stumacher attempted to construct in her column some sort of connection between the closing of the campus HIV test site and federal priorities ("The toughest test," DP, 3/25/96). The only clearly discernible message behind the closing the on-campus site is that the federal government is finally starting to demonstrate some accountability for how it throws our tax money around. The country is five trillion dollars in debt, and to avoid the economic graveyard we're hurtling toward, the feds are cutting a program whose services are already provided by two nearby clinics. We could put a test site on every block if you like, but we would have to dramatically increase taxes on the working poor and everyone else to do it. Stumacher enumerated several points the government is tackling: balancing the budget (the horror!), cutting the taxes of families with children (how could it!) and returning power to the states (which is where it belongs, unless the 10th Amendment is part of a government conspiracy). Prudent financial management insures that funds will exist tomorrow to pay for continued social programs. As far as misguided federal priorities are concerned, HIV/AIDS research is allocated the most money of any single disease, though others, notably cancer, affect far greater numbers of citizens. Closing the on-campus HIV test site to save limited funds is common sense. Unfortunately, common sense just isn't that common. Matthew Egel Wharton '98 Feeling pressure to be thin To the Editor: Hirschmann began her speech last Monday evening by explaining why she disagrees with the term "Eating disorders." She explained that it is not a disorder when 90 percent of women in our culture share the same fears of food, fat and body hatred. Similar to the Victorian notion that women suffered from wandering uteruses, our culture is labeling women's suffering with food as disordered and not calling it what it is -- a paradox of trying to obtain an unrealistically thin body when we need fat (and lots of it) to live, reproduce and be happy. The United States tells women and girls we're not allowed to eat. Who's crazy -- us or society? Needless to say, our hearts sank when we saw the headline of the article on Hirschmann's speech, which called her an eating disorder expert ("Eating disorder expert discusses image, dieting," DP, 3/26/96). She is an anti-diet leader who tours the nation reaffirming for women that diets and weight control do not work. It's time we stop pretending we can obtain or maintain thin bodies and do something about what the diets have been designed to do -- keep us from being complete and successful human beings in our society. To keep us from from demanding equal pay for equal work. To keep up from demanding an end to the misogyny in this culture that lets men get away with raping women -- and a million other injustices in our culture. Most importantly, I would never say that 90 percent of women suffer from eating disorders. Ninety percent of women feel the pressure to keep their bodies small and insignificant and are sold fraudulent products that promise this unrealizable dream -- including shelves and selves of fat-free products. Are we disordered? I don't think so. Angela Ferrari GUIDE co-advisor
