Budget cuts call students to action
David Olivieri
How annoying are these budget cuts?
The Thompson Tutoring Center has started to charge, and soon the math and writing centers will be terminated. Then there is the rise of tuition and more parking tickets.
As students, we just want a fantastic experience in college. We want to learn not just in academic areas but elsewhere, such as in student government and professional internships.
What we forget to realize is that outside of this university is the real world, where money is short and dreams fade.
The real world is our ultimate test. These budget cuts are an actual glimpse of reality; recessions will come and go and even a few depressions will hit us, but what we are learning now at this university will mold our future selves.
As Americans, we live in a country that is a beacon of hope. We are the most productive and determined in the world, and these hard economic times are affecting everyone. As undergraduates at the University of Nevada, Reno, we have to harness our ingenuity and deliver the best programs on campus.
Every dimension of this student body has to become mobilized to find solutions instead of relying on our state government or our university officials.
Just this past week our director of Clubs and Organizations, Jason Entsminger, along with our student body president developed a program called Student Organizations as Academic Resources (SOAR).
“This initiative aims to develop a peer tutoring program that is by students, for students, by involving student organizations as the organizers, providers and stakeholders of a program that provides access to basic academic resources,” Entsminger said.
This is what I’m talking about — our creativity has to drive our campus to do great things.
As leaders, we have to get more involved and change our campus from the ground up, rather than from the top down.
Freshman, we rely on you to continue our great tradition of active involvement to rid this campus of apathy. The more apathy we have on campus, the greater these financial situations will affect us and our community,
Besides, more student involvement not only creates new avenues of opportunity but it helps to fix problems in the community or on our campus. The appalling crimes on our campus last year were given immediate attention from our student officials and administrators, passing several proposals to help combat crime.
As students at this university and citizens of our nation, we must not allow these harsh realities to get the best of us.
So all I ask is that you don’t forget that the real solution starts with you.
David Olivieri is a columnist for The Nevada Sagebrush. He can be reached at editor@nevadasagebrush.com.
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October 22nd, 2008 at 8:28 pm
I agree with Mr. Olivieri that it begins from the ground up but when cuts happen higher up, it makes it so much more difficult to affect ground level changes.
Case in point: This is my second year here at UNR and as an African-American grad student, this past year, I have felt the issues from attending a predominantly white institution like being the only one, ethnically, in my classes (in my dept. for that matter) but you deal with it.
In my second year, we get the budget cuts. The Center for Student Cultural Diversity loses the part-time Black Culture Cooperative coordinator ( I will not get into the fact that it is only a Part Time position! At one time we were worth at least 3/5!), the Special Assistant to the President on Diversity will not be replaced, ASUN cuts the Diversity Chair. I understand that cuts happen but it seems diversity is the place to cut. And it all coincides with seeing graffiti in a bathroom depicting a man hanging from a tree with a derogatory term written underneath and a person standing next to the tree in a hood. Or hearing about a caucasian employee (now former employee) uttering racially discriminatory terms amongst a group of people, (also caucasian) and only one person speaking up against him.
Is it odd that these occurrences happen after budget cuts and more on the horizon? I think that this University needs some diversity training for major groups on campus i.e. greek letter organizations, ROTC, BSO, etc. as well as departments such as Campus Escort. Understand that these trainings should not be limited to predominantly white organizations but also those predominantly non-white because we all need it. Oops, I forgot no money.
President Glick said that these cuts will change the direction of this institution. Will it be a direction that is less welcoming to people of color? Maybe we already on that path.