Our Readers' Voice

Apparently, the Bible doesn't encompass the "Soulwinners" on campus who did not take their own advice when viciously preaching select verses of the Bible to any passerby. Many students stood encircling the so-called "sin-free saints," infuriated and in disbelief as accusations and Anti-Semitic statements, banners and T-shirts polluted the area.

Interesting: Jesus preached that you should treat your fellow neighbor as you yourself would be treated, and yet innocent spectators were judged and scrutinized without cause. I would hardly say these dogmatists were fulfilling acts of the Lord as He would have it. Additionally, is it the Christian way to preach unjustified views about the core of the religion without once upholding any of the Ten Commandments themselves?

In fact, the "Soulwinners" have discriminated against many oppressed groups that have plagued our society for so long. Is it ignorance, spite or genuine belief in what they preach that drives these individuals? I don't know - but what I do know is the enforcement of "sinners" being "condemned to hell" is spurring hate against groups that have progressively fought for equality.

Homosexuals were singled out with malice, and after witnessing a gay man being pushed and scrutinized by these Bible-preaching individuals, it is clear these acts cannot go unacknowledged.

Yes, Venyah and his group were still within their First Amendment Rights; it does not, however, make their message and how it was being delivered acceptable by any means. Strip away the cover of the Bible and all that's left is hate speech. Plain and simple.

The last time I checked, this university doesn't tolerate hate-speech or discrimination. Is it not hate-speech and discrimination to accuse anyone who is a non-Christian of being nothing but a dirty sinner and condemning them all to eternal life in hell?

I was utterly disgusted at this group of bigots "preaching" on this campus. Isn't there anything CMU can do to keep these spreaders of hate from scrutinizing the students here? It's one thing to encounter and dodge men trying to force-feed us "little green books" on the crowded sidewalks on the way to class. It's even one thing to hear men screaming out religious views for hours on end. We can tolerate those actions of freedom.

But it's another thing when the "Soulwinners" are interfering with education, instigating near-riot arguments, and infesting the student body with prejudice, segregation and supremacy-evoking ideas.

Various campus-wide questionnaires regarding students' overall experience at CMU address how safe students feel on campus. To answer this question - by allowing the "Soulwinners" to stay on campus for an entire week, I feel my safety has been somewhat jeopardized. My beliefs, lifestyle and general well-being have been attacked and scrutinized, and I speak on behalf of the crowds gathered around these hate-spreading hypocrites. Frankly, the university's administration needs to step in when its students become targets of hate speech.

-Essexville senior Trisha Hebert and Bay City junior Mallory Martens

I found the numeric changes at CMU noted in last Wednesday's guest editorial, to be especially interesting. In fact, that interest stimulated me to reflect on what has changed in my classes over the (roughly) 10-year period during which the on-campus enrollment increased by 15 percent, the student-faculty ratio increased by 13 percent, and the number of regular faculty grew by but 4 percent.

A decade or so ago, there were, typically, 25 to 35 students in each of my classes, with some classes in the high teens. One of my classes had essay tests and a paper, with the others having three (written) case analyses and a moderately generous dose of essay items on the bi-weekly tests. Today, the enrollments in my classes are usually in the mid-'40s to mid-'50s, the case analyses are long gone, and rarely do my students see essay questions. The increased time demands, a function of increased grading, increased advising, and increased internship supervision, coupled with increased pressures for research and service, have forced me to change pedagogy, and I am painfully aware of the fact that, unfortunately, the change has not been a positive one.

As I thought about the changes which have taken place in my classes, I decided to solicit the perceptions of some of my colleagues. Not surprisingly, they reported similar changes: less writing, shorter writing assignments and fewer experiences that involved active learning. One of my colleagues even characterized his current pedagogy as revenue-based academics. This is what characterizes a quality education?

CMU's Vision Statement identifies that we are currently attempting to become a a nationally prominent university known for academic excellence. I guess I'm a little unsure as to how this will happen unless we begin to make some fundamental changes in how we approach undergraduate education.

-Ronald Beaulieu Professor of Management

Instead of organizing CMU's Constitution Day forum, political science department professor Joyce Baugh should go back to school and hit the books.

Baugh pretends to be an expert when it comes to the Constitution, but the keyword here is pretends.

If she actually knew what she was teaching, she would not be organizing a forum that is nothing more than radical propaganda -- aimed at indoctrinating young, impressionable collegians.

She should study the remarks of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, an African-American, who said the Constitution does not permit affirmative action during a gathering of historically black colleges earlier this week.

CMU students want to be educated, not indoctrinated. It is time for Baugh to drop her political agenda at the classroom door.

-Topinabee senior Dennis Lennox II

The word "fair" has been used in virtually every article and op/ed piece about the CMU Faculty Association that Central Michigan Life has printed.

Certainly it's clear why a faculty association desires to see faculty members treated fairly. However, many students and administrators at CMU and virtually all Mount Pleasant residents might be very surprised at how specific is the concern of the FA: the concern is limited to the members of the FA union, and that membership is barred to large numbers of CMU faculty.

The FA limits its membership to tenured and tenure-track faculty, and even Weinstock, Brookes and Woods in their Sept. 10 guest column admit that the number of temporary faculty has increased by more than 20 percent in the last five years alone. Temporary faculty currently comprise 38 percent of those instructing students at CMU.

The official designation of "temporary faculty" is a perfect example of Orwell's doublespeak, as temporary faculty members often teach at CMU for periods of five, 10, 20 and even 25 years or more, but the FA dismisses those faculty members as some lower order of the species of university faculty and prohibits their joining the Faculty Association. In this, apparently, perhaps all faculty members are equal, but some are more equal than others.

In fact, the "temporary" faculty teach an even greater percentage of the classes and the students at CMU than is at first apparent from the mere fact that 38 percent of faculty are not either tenured or tenure-track.

Tenured and tenure-track faculty who teach full time are, by contract, usually required to teach 15 credit hours per year (five 3-credit-hour classes), and temporary faculty are required to teach 24 credit hours per year to be considered full-time, so a full-time FA member has taught a total of fewer than 50 sections over a 10-year period (time off for sabbatical, of course), and a temporary faculty member who has taught full-time for ten years has taught 80 sections.

In addition, temporary faculty members are typically assigned the undergraduate classes with the largest numbers of students - 50, or 100, or even more students per section - while FA members (who generally have some say in what classes and sections they will teach) prefer graduate seminars with a total enrollment of a dozen or 18 students.

The fairness (or UNfairness) of the situation faced by "temporary faculty," who must either accept or reject any contract offered by CMU and who consider themselves lucky if they are offered full-year contracts rather than single-semester, seems to be of less than no concern to the FA.

At CMU, temporary faculty, as a result of their exclusion from the FA, typically earn one-quarter to one-third what the FA members earn. In a blatant example of how to add insult to injury, some FA members have recently solicited support from temporary faculty, and they have been shocked to learn that most temporary faculty will be happy to cross any picket line composed of FA members.

Perhaps if the CMU Faculty Association were actually representative of the faculty at CMU, the use of the word "fair" by FA members would be somewhat less ironic, and ALL faculty at CMU might hope one day to be equally equal.

-Denise Kaiser Mount Pleasant resident