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Show Our Commuter Campus I By SUSAN DICKMAN (EDITOR'S NOTE: Miss Dickman contributes today to-day the first in a series on problems facing the University as a "streetcar campus.") A University is more than a collection of classrooms and lectures. It is an effecting force which "bends" the character of its student body and ought, ideally, to be the focal point of a student's life for the period during which he attends it. GEOGRAPHY, culture and politics have combined to give the University of Utah an "effective" environment unique among state institutions of its size. The average students claims to be unaffected unaffect-ed by the University environment. But this very unaffeotiveness is a ramification of the environment. THE UNIVERSITY is not a community, nor is it "university orientated." It is a meeting place for small cliques, who attend its classes and most of which have a social orientation of their own. Causes and effects of this "atmosphere," obvious in all aspects of University life, need examination. THE UNIVERSITY is metropolitan. Located in Salt Lake City, the center of population density den-sity between Denver and the west coast, the University necessarily draws a large number of students who are residents of the metropolitan area. There are now four-year universities and colleges located within one hundred miles of the University. This concentration of competition, competi-tion, naturally, makes it harder for the Univer sity to "pull" in-state-residents, who live outside out-side the immediate area. FINALLY, nonresident students seem to be discriminated against. The University with its state, federal and private funds subsidizes 66 per cent of the cost of the education of each student, and as a state institution, its first responsibility re-sponsibility is to the students and taxpayers of the state of Utah. The Board of Regents were, thus, forced to increase fees for non-resident students. Though recognizing that "the contributions of non-resident students in the classroom an dto the student stu-dent life are considerable. . ., in response to a request of Governor Rampton and in recognition recogni-tion of the disparity between the non-resident fees and the cost of educating these students, is it the intention of the Regents to increase non-resident fees." SO DESPITE the statements of the adminis-stration adminis-stration to the effect that "norr-resident students stu-dents enrich the student body, we seek them," the non-resident student is financially discou'r-expressed discou'r-expressed by Admissions Director Dr. McKean aged from attending the University. Scholarship aid is more difficult for the non-resident to procure. THERE are thirty scholarship awards available avail-able specifically for the non-resident. The nonresident non-resident may also compete for scholarships offered of-fered by the different colleges. But Presidential waivers of tuition are not applicable to nonresidents. non-residents. The University seems, of necessity, dedicated dedicat-ed to the educations of the Salt Lake County resident. |