Brown and White Vol. 93 no. 8

              lehigh university brown and white vol 93 — no 8 bethlehem pa friday september 25 1981 215 861-4184 forum discusses rare book sale by michelle demon a portion of the rare book collection must be sold to fund the proposed mart library addition according to erie ottervik vice president of planning the sale was discussed at wednes day's forum xii meeting also dis cussed was the initiation of a student activities fee the communication barri ers between stabler arena and the uni versity and the guidelines of the social policy and regulations subcommittee ottervik said the administration has been working to refine the design of the new library and to achieve more relia ble cost estimates with the help ol a local contracter these efforts have suc ceeded in reducing the total estimated costs of the project he said he explained that although the univer sity does not want to sell the rare books there is no alternate way to raise enough money to fund the construction of a new library we cannot do without a new library we can do without some portion of the rare book collection regrettable though that prospect is ottervik said according to ottervik the collection must be inventoried catalogued appraised and then evaluated in terms of potentially saleable items so that its total value may be determined a few people have made estimates of what the collection is worth today although the exact figure is unknown he said the estimated value of the collection must be entered somewhere for insu rance purposes ottervik said adding that the director of libraries is now busy inventorying the entire collection this has not been done in recent years ottervik said no items will be sold that are important to lehigh's academic or research programs or that have some unique relationship to our history or the region's history the actual market value of the books was questioned by steven krawiec asso ciate professor of biology ottervik said that because they are not a part of the endowment they are not earning inter est and don't contribute to the process of earning interest in the annual operating budget of the university he added that they are non-liquid assets ottervik stated that we have to work with our legal counsel to determine which books we're entitled to and which were willed to us in such a way that we can't get rid of them any individual item may not be sale able for any number of reasons we may not want to sell it it may not have any real market value we may not be able to sell it or it may be in such bad shape that it can't be sold these are questions that need to be answered he said the full text of ottervik's speech appears on page 4 in other business preston parr dean and vice president of student affairs spoke on behalf of the administration about the initiation of a student activities fee as it has been university policy not to have such a fee the real issue now is the level of funding and how to achieve it in a way that would not put it into competi tion with other elements of the budget parr said the administration committee chaired by michael pressler assistant professor of english also addressed this topic during the year the cultural schedul ing and publicity subcommittee will investigate the need for a student activi ties fee pressler said this subcommittee will also attempt to establish a more efficient system of com munication and coordination of activi ties with stabler arena according to pressler the communication breakdown that occasioned the delay of university day will occur again according to robert barnes professor of philosophy and trustee representative of the forum if policy is not developed to prevent this from happening barnes requested that this subcom mittee clarify in its reports where the steinem returns to campus urges institutional change by mary frances donley in the past decade the women's move ment has experienced raised hopes and a reality that hasn't budged too much said gloria stein em in a lecture wednes day highlighting women's week at the i niversity the well known activist and editor of ms magazine returning to the univer sity for tin first time since its co education noted the enormous progress made in this decade as far as legislation regarding equal pay and sex ual discrimination we have had many revelations in the past 10 years steinem remarked to the mostly female audience of nearly 900 i used to say that i wanted a revo lution not a reform because that's what was taken seriously by my male col leagues she said then i found out that they meant taking over the radio station and the army i wanted more than that we become more radical with age she added noting that the teenage years and the twenties are when women are most conservative another revelation of the past decade was that yomen cannot sleep their way to the top . . . if they could there would be a lot more women at the top " for the future steinem said she would like to see institutional change to bring legal equality to a greater number of people this includes the ratification of the equal rights amendment era . she noted that the majority of the american public favors ratification oi the amendment but it is being held upbj the decision of two dozen aging white males in three state legislatures reproductive freedom according to steinem is what 10 years ago would have been called population control the right to decide to have or not to have a child is a basic human right as basic as freedom of speech or assem bly this freedom also includes the right to a safe and legal abortion she added charging that ultra-conservative factions such as the moral maj or itj politicize sexuality steinem also called for a worldwide re-definition of work noting that homemakers work longer hours than anyone have a higher incidence of vio lence on the job drug addiction alcoho lism tension and are more likely to be replaced by a younger worker the image of homemakers as inferior to those who work outside the home is not limited to western industrialized socie ties she noted in third world and agri cultural societies women produce food to feed their families but do not work she said adding that work should be defined by the real value of the work not the social value of the worker steinem also cited families plural as a concern for the decade ahead not just the patriarchal family change is really a part of our whole lives steinem noted adding that change begins in small groups and fam ily units in our personal day-to-day relationships we see the models tor our political relations she said adding there can be no turning back " bs.w photo by women's activist gloria steinem speaks to a crowd of nearly 1,000 wednesday night in packer chapel on reproductive freedom restructuring family units and ratification ol era forum heads describe roles overyears by michelle demon eleven years ago students | demanded a share of the legislative 1 power at the university after days of i both protest and peaceful demonstra tions students faculty and adminis tration created the university forum a system of government that : would equally disperse this power between the three entities with the creation of the forum stu dents were given the opportunity to | become involved with the decision making process concerning major | campus issues in the 11 years of its existence the i i forum has had only two student | | chairmen though a college genera i tion apart these students had many | similar experiences during their term in office each became as one | i student remarked the most power i ful student leader on campus in the spring of 1977 brian finn | i 78 was chosen over two opponents to | | be chairman of the forum viii this | | past year lisa fisher 83 was nomi | | nated to be chairman of forum xii i and ran unopposed as chairman each student faced | see ottervik page 5 see fisher page 10