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Show 2 Signpost Friday, May 16, 1986 Nobel prize winner petitions for peaceful solutions by Penny RowLee Staff Reporter "Women are the givers of life, why on earth are we not the protectors?" said Betty Williams, first speaker in the Nobel Prize series for convocations yesterday. Williams has dedicated her life to seeking peaceful solutions to many of the world's problems. Williams was raised in Ireland by her Catholic mother and Protestant father. "I guess this is an idealistic situation," she said, "where my mother and father fought about everything but religion." Throughout Williams' youth she never encountered discrimination until she was 16 years old and denied a job because she was Catholic. There have been times when Catholics were not allowed to vote or, own property and could only secure the worst jobs. She saw a lot of discrimination while attending Queen's University in Belfast, where only 17 of the 400,000 students were Catholic. She joined a group with the goal of helping change the situation in Ireland but left it when the group turned to violence. Williams has a Ph.D. in political science and phiolsophy. For 14 years she found herself in a position of watching the violence on Ireland's streets. "God has his reasons for everything. You're put in a circumstance which leads you to something God wants you to do," she said. Then on August 10, 1976, she witnessed three innocent children die on Belfast's streets because of violence. Williams said she was able to distin-quish between gunfire of the fighting factions. That day she was driving home when she heard a gunfire exchange. The driver of a military vehicle was killed 1" " :-ry'"-vy"v . .. ....... ...i.... ulitvt. ., ', . i .... - - . - 1 -'V'fSfifrMif-"- .......... a. ... . Slgtipwit pholo Oscar Sosa Betty Williams, Nobel peace prize winner, spoke at convocations yesterday. and the car hit a mother and her three children. As Williams held one of the dying children, she vowed to do something to stop the violence. Williams' shock at what she had witnessed turned to anger. "Anger can be a very creative emotion or a very destructive one. I thank God seven days a week that the anger I felt became a creative anger and not a destructive one," she said. She then went into a terrorist neighborhood and knocked on doors, asking women to unite and sign a petition to fight the violence peacefully. In three-and-a-half hours she obtained more than 6,000 signatures. She found she had "lifted the lid to thousands of women who were feeling exactly like I felt. We figured that Ann McQuire was in the wrong place at the wrong time with her babies. It could have been any one of us. It could have been any other woman in the wrong place at the wrong time." "' ' Y'V?? BT '" ' Business Managaer Ken Hill Ass't Business Manager Emilie Bean Editor-in-Chief Rae Dawn Olbert Advertising Agent Bob George Managing Editor Chris J. Miller Production Managers Emilie Bean Jeannine Anderson News Editor Loretta Park Production Staff Shawn Sturgeon Cheryl Watson Ass't News Editor JaNae Barlow LeAnn Parker Jay Watts Sports Editor Mike Coe Don Karmondy Ilene Wangsgard Ass't Sports Editor Dave Allison , Mike Buck Jared Preisler Entertainment Editor Leona Vandre Staff Reporters Cathe Guptill Copy Editors Linda Nimori Robert Potts Ann Stevenson Dan A. Taylor Brian Growcock Photo Editor Rory Easley Tanja Schaffer David Bird Chief Photographer Scott Miller Doug Burch Jana Chesley Photographers Jeff Bybee Mikel Bowman Oscar Sosa' Dana Hanson Chris Loftus Penny RowLee Mike Tupa Graphic Artist Steve Thorpe Matthew Madsen Debra Ann Moss ... , , , Janet Bassett Advisor Larry Stahle , , , Jeanne Chadey Publisher Randolph J. Scott Kathryn Ward Lynn Soltys Ann Dolan After collecting the signatures, she formed a rally. When how many she expected to attend the rally, she counted herself and one other. 10,000 came. Each week for the next 12 rallys the number increased substantially, Williams said. From the rallys she formed the Community of Peace People. At one point the media referred to her and her associates as "ordinary housewives." This angered Williams. She doesn't consider any housewife to be ordinary. It was this band of "ordinary housewives" that helped find peaceful solutions to Ireland's discrimination problems. In 1976 a group of Norweigan newspapers raised approximately $250,000 and gave it to the Community of Peace People. This money was put in a trust to help the people. The Peace People formed small neighborhood groups and asked them what the local problems were. Peace People then collected information and worked to overcome them. One example, said Williams, is the building of several factories. These began as small factories, but have grown to have a significant effect on the unemployment rate in Ireland. A lifeline was also set up to help the victims of violence, a reconciliation center, and what Willims calls "her baby," Ireland's first fully-integrated school. In order to open the school Williams had to fight the hierarchy of the church. It opened against all odds with 16 students, half of them Catholic, the other half Protestant. Now enrollment is full capacity with 500600 students, and a waiting list of 10 years. It was recently designated the top school in the United Kingdom, she said. Williams has traveled extensively and considers her Nobel Prize a gift from God. She uses it to help get her message to the people. Of the places she has visited she mentioned briefly Nicaragua and Ethiopia. She said what the U.S. government is telling the Americans about Nicaragua is not correct. "Sandanistas are the choice of the people," she said. "I saw people practice religion in absolute freedom." The Sandinistas have completely wiped out tuberculosis and are educating the people, according to Williams. From her observations of Communist countries she has visited, she said the Communists do not arm their people. "The Sandanistas have," she said. Williams traveled to Ethiopia to help disperse food to many villages. She described the scenes she saw of undernourishment and disease. "I ask you to think about that because after all, you have time to think while others die," she said. Perkes named head Director sets program's goals by Doug Burch Staff Reporter "Hands on experience is one thing that I really believe in as far as education is concerned" and this is what A. Cordell Perkes has with his new position as Director of Masters of Education.Perkes a native of Wellsville in Cache County now resides in Taylor with his wife and four children ages 19 to 8 years old. He did his undergraduate and Masters work at Utah State University with emphasis in the science areas. After graduating he completed his PHD work in Science Education at Ohio State in Colubus Ohio in 1973. He taught science in Utah and Nevada on the junior high and high school levels. Then he joined the staff of George Mason University in Farfax Virginia teaching research and science methods. He returned to Utah and served three years as the elementary education department chair at Weber State College. As head of the combined WSCUSU program Perkes wants to raise public awareness of the graduate program offered on campus. "We're going out in to the community to talk with the school superintendents and principals to discuss our program," he said. "If we can get the support of these people we know we can have a higher success rate with our enrollment." Perkes is also working on developing a new brochure for the program. "When we get the thing put together we'll mail it out to the teachers. It will explain how they can improve on their teaching skills as well as the monetary rewards of a master's degree." "When people finish the program I hope they can teach their students to become more critical thinkers," he said. "I want them to teach students to think on a higher level than recall, and I want them to be professional and skilled as well .as a big asset to their schools." |
