Letters

To the Editor,

UNLV Parking is ridiculous. Not only the parking situation, but parking enforcement! Read more

Letters: On-campus military recruiting

To the Editor,

Last week, as many people may have seen, the Army had a large setup by the library with what I understood to be some type of flight simulator and a rock climbing wall. I may have missed it if there were any additional “attractions” but I was too busy looking, in shock, at the line of students waiting to ride the simulators. Read more

Letters

To the Editor,

Senator Rapoport’s request that the emails of President Cronis be made public is absolutely ridiculous. Cronis has never given anyone reason to believe he has unethical work behavior. He has even voted to reduce the amount of credits that are reimbursed for holding positions in student government (which includes his position!). Rapoport sounds more like a jealous lover than a concerned student. Perhaps no one else wants to run right now because of the huge budget crisis and the massive time commitment needed to be president. Read more

Letters: Regarding free scantrons

To the Editor,

As I flip through the freshly placed Rebel Yell I stumble across a letter to the editor [March 16]. In it, you express your anger and concern at having “to pay an additional 42 cents for scantrons.” I humbly apologize for making you shell out two quarters for something you “already paid for,” but I must inform you that you haven’t already paid for them. Read more

Letters: Air conditioning and scantrons

To the Editor,

Can we please turn the air conditioning off?

So I thought we were having a budget crisis? Isn’t that what that whole giant rally earlier this year was about? How devastating the proposed drastic budget cuts would be to Nevada Higher Education?

Then why are we wasting our already hurting budget on air-conditioning the law building to extremes?

I’ve tried without much avail to contact the maintenance department about this problem. It was a humane temperature for about 2 days before reverting back to a temperature where I could safely store dairy product.

I mean don’t get me wrong…not having to store my water in the fridge because it will stay cool enough in the ambient law school air is convenient.

But after seeing my electric bill this summer…I’m more than a little irritated when I think about the potential energy costs of cooling a LARGE building down to around 64 degrees when it’s 65 degrees outside. Is this really necessary?

Not to mention it really defeats the excitement of springtime and finally not having to carry around a jacket when I have to plan on bringing one to wear solely indoors. 

Alison Coombs, 

Law student

 

To the Editor, 

Thirty minutes before my accounting exam last week Wednesday, I walked on over to the Student Union info desk for a scantron, only to find a sign that says “Out of scantrons, can be purchased at bookstore.”

At first I thought it was a joke because I know that the cost of scantrons is included in our student fees (either in our technology fee of $60 or our student fac fee of $173). So when the student worker told me that they ran out of scantrons and that I should purchase one at the bookstore, I wasn’t very pleased. Why? Because I already paid for them!

Every year a portion of our student fees is supposed to go towards things like scantrons so that students don’t have to spend additional money to get them. By not having them available, I think it does a big disservice to the students.

One reason could be that the student workers at the info desk are not monitoring the scantrons properly. I remember when phase one of the Student Union opened in the Fall of 2006, workers would only give out one scantron at a time.

Thus, scantrons were more closely monitored and we never had to buy them. If you had two exams in one day, they would allow you to come back and pick up another one. Unfortunately, now they are being left on top of the info desk in chunks where people can take as many as they want.

I challenge both the supervisors as well as the student workers at the Student Union’s information desk to better monitor the scantrons, and see to it that this does not happen again. As students, we should not have to pay an additional 42 cents for scantrons coming from the bookstore when it should be included in our student fees.

Another reason why there could be a shortage of scantrons could be students taking more than they need. A few times I’ve walked past the info desk I’ve seen students take as many as five scantrons. Either that person got really unlucky and had 5 exams on the same day, or that person is just being selfish.

I challenge every undergraduate and graduate student to be considerate of others and take only what you need.

To be fair, I think it’s a combination of the two. Scantrons are not being monitored properly and students are just being selfish by taking more than they need. If we can manage them better and not take more than we need, there should be more than enough scantrons to go around.

After all, I’m not asking for a free scantron, I’m asking for one I paid for. 

William Smith,

Economics Major

Letters: Response to ‘A Pro-Palestinian view’ and ‘Rebels seal BYU sweep’

To the Editor,

A RESPONSE TO ‘A PRO-PALESTINIAN VIEW ‘(FEB. 23, 2009)

“The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance… it is the illusion of knowledge.” Read more

Re: Speaker rebuts drug policy

To the Editor,

Stephen H. Frye hit the bull’s-eye calling for credible drug law reform (Speaker Rebuts Drug Policy, Feb. 19, 2009) and that means Re-legalizing cannabis (marijuana) at the very least. Read more

RE: The irony of budget cuts and tuition increases

To the Editor,

(“The irony of budget cuts and tuition increases,” Jan. 26, 2009) 

In his article on budget cuts, and tuition increases,  Matthew Jarzen, does an excellent job of summing up the opinion of many conservatives. I think he raises a few good points and articulates his arguments well. However, the positions that he takes and the persuasive techniques he uses to convey them reveal a shallowness of understanding.

Mr. Jarzen reduces the current crisis to an abstraction to avoid having to deal with the reality of what the governor’s plan would do to our community. He also draws a false analogy between taxes and tuition without acknowledging their disparate impacts on different demographic groups. Finally, he tries to justify the proposed cuts by pointing out that he himself managed to cope with financial difficulties as a student and that everyone just needs to “tighten their belts.”

My response to Mr. Jarzen’s arguments is as follows.

First, Governor Gibbons’ plan to gut the higher education system rather than raise taxes is far from a lofty political stance. It is the act of an arrogant and stubborn public official who is willing to carry out his policies regardless of reality (i.e. George W. Bush). The governor’s plan would destroy our system of higher education, decrease the long-term economic health of our community by dumbing down the workforce, and thereby reduce the growth of high-skill / high-paying industries in Las Vegas.

Second, there is a significant difference between taxes and tuition. Taxes are levied according to assets (i.e. property taxes) and income. Those who have more pay more. This is not an unjust system if one considers the fact that those who benefit the most from a community’s laws, infrastructure, and justice system ought to pay their share for its upkeep. Tuition, on the other hand, is levied against all students regardless of their financial circumstances. It thus places an incommensurate burden on those who have the least ability to pay. This result, when combined with significant reductions in financial aid, is patently unjust.

Third, I do not agree that students should simply work harder, pay higher tuition, and “tighten their belts” to compensate for the budget cuts. I myself worked three jobs (one of which was the opinion editor of The Rebel Yell) to help pay my own way through college and support my mother and little brother. Yet, the Millennium Scholarship, Pell Grant, and low tuition were essential in helping me survive. With financial aid drying up because of budget shortfalls at the state and federal level, it is now more important than ever to keep tuition low so that people like me, who come from low-income families and work multiple jobs to make ends meet, can still get a college education.

Nathan Sosa, 

Law School

Letters

To the Editor,

As a student at the University of Las Vegas, Nevada, I have seen first-hand the dire consequences the brutal cuts to education in Nevada as championed by Governor Gibbons will have for our state. Read more

Letters: Angry about impending tuition hike

 

I am flabbergasted that student tuition stands to go up to 25 percent next semester. Is it not enough that students are subject to the current economic down turn? Read more

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