Staff Editorial: Something to Hide? Committee Shuts out Reporter

MSU administrators at last week’s Student Allocation Committee meeting forced a Wichitan reporter to leave the room before deliberations could begin. This is the body that decides how much of the $2.1 million in Student Service Fees each campus organization gets. Twenty-four organizations fall under this umbrella.
The five-member student committee deals with how your money is spent but if you or representatives from one of these organizations wants to see or hear or learn exactly how it’s divvied up you’re out of luck.
You’ll be told the committee functions simply in an “advisory” capacity, and that its decisions can be finalized or changed only by MSU President Jesse Rogers or the Board of Regents. A Texas Attorney General’s opinion states that as long as the committee is “advisory” then it can operate behind closed doors.
That’s what it says on paper, but a look at the history of the committee shows that the only changes the BOR makes to the student committee’s budget include last minute decisions, such as new hirings that were not known about at the time of the allocations committee meeting, and other unforeseen circumstances. A cushion, incorporated into the allocation budget, takes care of anything new that might come up. Neither Rogers nor any of his representatives or any members of the BOR has ever taken money from one department and given it to another after the budget has left the Student Allocation Committee. The decisions of the students on the committee are still reflected.
Although the committee’s decisions may be advisory on paper, in practice the student committee’s decisions are binding.
During an interview session, representatives from each campus organization must appear briefly before the committee with a budget and answer questions. Then they leave the room.
The Wichitan was turned down on its request to sit in on the deliberation proceedings, which follow the interviews. This is difficult to understand. If the media (or you, for that matter) want to attend an SGA meeting, you can stay from beginning to end. The same holds true for a meeting of the MSU Board of Regents. Conducting public business out in the open is what democracy is all about. It’s also the law. Failure to allow access is a violation of the state’s Open Meetings Law.
Yet, the Student Allocations folks along with the MSU administration insist on calling this committee “advisory” only. In doing so, they can hide behind closed doors while they jockey with your money.
 It shouldn’t be this way.
Taxpayers wouldn’t want anyone in possession of their money to discuss in secret how it’s spent. Students on the committee say they don’t want anyone else around (you or the press) because they’ll feel pressured.
Good!
Committee members are like actors who don’t want to go on stage for fear of critics. Government officials such as congressmen are required to perform in front of an audience, whether they like it or not. Since the committee members are appointed by the president of Student Government, they are public officials and must stand up to the scrutiny of those they are representing.
With such a vast amount of money and such important decisions, students on the allocations committee need to be held publicly accountable for their actions. The purpose of having this committee in the first place is to ensure that the outcome will reflect the desires of the student body as a whole. However, in that same room with the students are administrators and accountants and faculty who are ex officio or non-voting members.
Since The Wichitan was shut out, we can’t help wondering who is really running the show. Once deliberations begin, is the committee being influenced by these very administrators, accountants and faculty? We can’t tell you, because they wouldn’t let us in. And if you try to get in, they’ll turn you away, too.
 Meanwhile, $2.1 million of your money (approximately $213 for a student taking 15 hours per semester) is on the table.
They want you to trust them.
Why should you when they won’t let you in?
Stay tuned for more.


Author seeks 'Men in Black Dresses' to gain Wisdom of the Modern World
Nicole Ford | Opinion Editor

In a speech last Thursday, Dr. Yvonne Seng talked about her book, “Men in Black Dresses,” which is about the quest for knowledge and how information can be transformed into wisdom in an age of technology.
“Because of technology, we are bombarded by information, and we must figure out how to turn information to thoughtful conversation, and information to knowledge,” Seng said.
The book was inspired by Y2K and society’s relationship with technology.
“We all thought we were going to be stuck on an elevator at midnight on New Year’s Eve. No one ever questioned the wisdom of why we would be stuck in an elevator at midnight on New Year’s Eve,” Seng said. “What it brought to the forefront was the difficult relationship we have with technology: that it’s part of our lives and taking over our lives, whether it’s for better or worse.”
Seng said she turned to the Middle East, the “first information highway,” to speak with religious leaders and get their unique perspective on the “state of the soul in an age of technology.”
“I wanted to talk to them about the Internet, about cloning and about space exploration,” Seng said. “Not the usual thing you run around the desert speaking about with monks and priests and bishops and popes, and also grand sheikhs of Islam, and mystics, but I wanted to get their perspective on where do we go from here.”
Seng said the priests in black dresses used to “scare the bloody hell” out of her, until she realized that they were just men who were imperfect and human like she was.
Her journey began years before, on a train in Egypt where she made a promise to an old man, a bishop of the Catholic Coptic Church, to return one day to see the future.
“I’ve made a promise to dying man, and damn, he’s going to keep me to it,” Seng said, reading an excerpt from her book.
Fourteen years later, Seng returned to Egypt to fulfill her promise. She had 21 days to complete her project, and the names of only two people who she hoped would eventually lead her to men she wanted to speak with.
Within 24 hours, she was talking to Grand Sheikh of Al-Azhar Tantawi, a Sunni religious leader who had a “grand passion” for knowledge.
Seng told of a televised debate the sheikh had once participated in, during which the issue of transplanting organs was brought up.
“The other cleric leader said the donation of body parts was immoral, pagan and against God’s will. Sheikh Tantawi trumped him by declaring that he was donating his organs for transplant in case of his death.”
Seng said that she also discussed the environment with the sheikh, who said the earth was spiritual as well as physical and “comprises the creation of future generations” and that if the earth is poisoned, so are the children.
Seng said she started with Islamic religious leaders because she knew more about Islam than her own Christian religion. After Sheikh Tantawi, she decided to explore Coptic Christianity and spoke with Pope Shenouda, the bishop of youth, whom she referred to as the “sex and cyber copt.”
She spoke with Shenouda about the cultural impact of technology, who told her how young people in the Middle East would never turn their backs on their elders because it was a sign of disrespect. However, now young people are spending their time on computers, with their back to their families and communities. Seng said it is becoming more important for parents to instill strong values in their children at a younger age.
“It’s like giving the keys of a car to a teenager; there’s nothing more to teach. They’re no longer a child,” Seng said. “When the parents hand over the keys to the computer, they are setting the child free into the global community, and they are trying to do it with wisdom.”
In her travels, Seng also spoke to Pope Zakku, a Syrian pope who had devoted his life to preserving Aramaic, the language of Christ.
When she asked Zakku if he believed humans would one day discover life in outer space, he said that he did, because “God is capable of making anything he wishes,” and that when he meets these other life forms, he’ll teach them Aramaic.
 Seng then asked Zakku about peace, which, he said, “looks like a tired old man.”
“He said that peace starts with an individual and radiates outward. It begins with a person and spreads to the world,” Seng said.
At the end of the journey for her book, Seng returned to the church where the old man on the train had been a bishop, where she would see the future. In place of the man’s library, there was a room full of computers with young people using them.
In a question and answer session, Seng spoke about the state of women’s rights in the Middle East.
“The women are rejecting Western attempts at women’s rights. Instead, they are saying, ‘we want human rights,’” Seng said.
Seng also said that for the world to attain peace, the situation in Israel and Palestine must be solved.
“It’s taking away hope for the future. The people are ready. They’re saying, ‘give us peace and we’ll get on with it.’”



Student-Directed plays Premiere this Weekend
Paige Dickerson | Managing Editor