To the Editor:
Thursday nights at 8 p.m., a ritual ensues much of the campus joins Rachel, Ross, Monica, Phoebe, Joey, and Chandler for a half hour of adventures in New York City. But this Thursday, I encourage students to pop a tape in the VCR and head over to Dartmouth Hall for the speech by Associate Dean of the Faculty George Wolford on the future of the education department.
Why give up the well-groomed cast of "
Friends" for this?
Because policy decisions are being made that will affect students' Dartmouth experience now and in the future. The Education Department may be downsized. The Teacher Preparation Program may be discontinued. The whole department may be completely axed.
Not all students are going to be teachers. Not all students scramble to get into the ever-popular Education 20. Regardless, every student has a stake in the elimination of a department -- particularly one which prepares our classmates to join that coterie that will someday instruct our children.
A considerable number of students showed in the past two student body elections, in their support for winning presidential candidates, that influencing policy at Dartmouth, be it changing Dartalk policies or making student life a budget priority, is important to them.
Students should make good on their interest and their votes and come tonight to understand what's going on. Dartmouth is what we make of it ... let's not let the faculty and administration make it for us.
