[comp.admin.policy] Re^2: harassing mail

grohol@novavax.UUCP (John Grohol) (05/28/91)

>In article <283BB48D.13A3@tct.com> chip@tct.com (Chip Salzenberg) writes:

>>>But, without the students the school wouldn't be able to get the grants
>>>needed to fund labs like the IPL.

> >  This line of reasoning is specious.  There is a practical infinity of
> >  things without which a university could not function: faculty, staff,
> >  buildings, phones, books, ...

> >  To single out students as essential and therefore give them what
> >  amounts to _carte_blanche_ with university property is unjustified.

Ummm, most universities I know (or a good many in the country) started
out with nothing more than a few students, a teacher or two, and a
hunger for knowledge. The buildings did not matter, there was no
staff, and books were used only when necessary. Without students and
without professors, university is nothing more than another research
center funded by the government. To imply otherwise shows a basic
lack of understanding of why universities exist.

-- 
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
 John M. Grohol                     ||  Nova University - Ft. Lauderdale, FL
 Internet: grohol@novavax.nova.edu  ||  Center for Psychological Studies    
  "So when you see a man who's broken, pick him up & carry him." - L. Anderson

chip@tct.com (Chip Salzenberg) (05/29/91)

According to grohol@novavax.UUCP (John Grohol):
>Without students and without professors, university is nothing more than
>another research center funded by the government. To imply otherwise shows
>a basic lack of understanding of why universities exist.

Perhaps I went a bit far in my original statement.  Let me try again:

The student body is key to the nature of a university.  Any given
individual student, however, is not.

A university's computer administration should be geared to the good of
the greater number of users, including the student body.  Such greater
good will, of necessity, deny privileges and services to individual
students, so that their abuse (the potential for which is always
present) cannot adversely impact the use of the computing resources by
the other users.
-- 
Chip Salzenberg at Teltronics/TCT     <chip@tct.com>, <uunet!pdn!tct!chip>
          perl -e 'sub do { print "extinct!\n"; }   do do()'