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Show DAILY UTAH CHRONICLE MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 1985 VOL. 95 NO. 9 UNIVERSITY OF UTAH 0 . gets funds for compute network U. student fees will fund a large portion of the program By Donn Walker ASUU President Ned Stringham said students are very near their financial limit to absorb further fee increases, but the benefits of the program are worth it. "All students will have a chance for hands-o- n experience and will get training in something they'll all be facing in the world tomorrow," he said. Peterson, probably the program's most enthusiastic booster, said computers are critical to education today. U. students will bear about a third S6 of the program's cost. to $7 million Beginning in January, students will be The University of Utah has announced a assessed a S2 surcharge for every credit $20 million program that will grant its hour of undergraduate courses and a S4 25,000 students access to a campuswide surcharge for each credit hour or graduate network of computers. courses. Funding for the program will come from Courses numbered from 100 to 499 are a variety of sources, including a hike in considered undergraduate, and those student fees which takes effect winter numbered 500 and above are graduate quarter 1986. The ASUU Assembly and level. the state Board of Regents both approved Another S3 million will come from the fee increase earlier this month. the The program will be implemented in faculty research funds, which will buy and three phases, beginning this academic year. huge "supermini" computers. Gifts StafT Writer It will place 1,000 personal computers in strategic locations throughout the campus. Over 70 sophisticated, intermediate-size- d computer work stations, eight "super- d mini" computers and a will be supercomputer mainframe high-spee- installed. In addition, an electronic library information system and a network linking campus computers will be put into operation during the program's third phase. University officials arc quick to praise what they say are the "populist" aspects of the program. Irwin Altman, U. vice distributors, combined with university president for academic affairs, said the plan calls for making computers accessible to the largest numbers of students possible. The school has no plans to make computer literacy an entrance requirement, he said, but instead will offer carrying 12 credit-hoursworkshops so students unfamiliar with the considered average at that level, for three machines can acquaint themselves with the quarters will pay $ 144 more over the course of the year. fundamentals of their use. recruiters that all of our students are literate both in writing and computers." continued on page four Summary of the University of Utah generous discounts from computer funds, will account for another $6 million. The last leg of the funding will come hopefully, say school administrators from the state Legislature. University officials will be lobbying in January for a S6 million appropriation to go toward the program's maintenance and support staff. "If the Legislature is unable to provide funds we won't stop the program, but we will have to slow down," said U. President Chase N. Peterson. So how will these numbers, specifically the fee increase, affect students' pocket-bookThose undergraduates who carry 15 credit hours, considered an average class load, for three quarters will pay $90 more in fees during the school year. Graduate-student- "Business as usual for higher education no longer acceptable," he said. "Our students professional careers depend on comprehensive knowledge about and skill in using computers. It is imperative that we make computing available to all students as a fundamental educational tool. "Eventually, I'd like to be able to say to is Computer Program Items Microcomputers (e. Phase Phase Phase Total n 1 II HI ofltems 200 400 400 1,000 15 35 20 70 2 8 APPLE. AT&T. IBM. NCR, etc.) Advanced Work Stations (e.g. M1CROVAS 11. etc.) s? , DEC, EL1XS1, GOULD, (e. HARRIS. IBM, etc.) s Supercomputer Mainframe t. CRAY, CYBER, SIERRA, etc.) Take advantage of opportunities, U. freshmen told at convocation by Lisa Carricaburu News Editor University of Utah upperclassmen may never have likened their educations to fungi, but it was just that analogy music professor Ardean Watts used while addressing U. freshmen Sunday night. The intricate process behind a blossomed mushroom, Watts told students during the U.'s first annual Freshman v Convocation, is not unlike the education process students will complete while attending the U. Supported by miles of filament and more than a billion cells directed toward the single blossom, Watts said a to gather enough fungus literally "turns itself inside-o- ut nutrients to produce its next generation." Similarly, he said U. freshmen must make an effort to "externalize what is inside while also interiorizing what is outside themselves." They must, he said, "take advantage of limitless resources now open to them to refine their own internal talents and abilities." "The University of Utah is an interiorization factory par excellence," Watts told the group gathered in f Kingsbury Hall. "I strongly encourage you to leave both fear and prejudice behind and bring with you the curiosity and joy vital to discover the infinite wonder of the I) S .... V I f l University of Utah music professor Ardean Watts, in an address to U. freshman Sunday, advised them to "turn education inside-out- ." 6 Supermini Computers universe." Calling college life a "time of self indulgence," sophomore honor student Hannah Horsley told freshmen they are beginning the only period of their lives when they will have the privilege of total freedom to indulge in themselves and their own minds. Advising the students to "take risks," she said she has learned to focus on learning rather than achievement. Achievement is good, Horsley said, but it should follow learning rather than replace it. "Be a lover," U. President Chase N. Peterson encouraged freshmen during the evening's keynote address. "I want you to leave this university vigorous, forceful, excited and completely in love with something." New students, he said, come to the U. "partially blind," but are about to complete "the process of learning to see." "You are not coming to the the 13th grade. You are beginning a very different process," Peterson said. "I want you to be productively scared, and I want there to be a few aspects of boot camp so you can attack this new experience in the most exciting intellectual sense." Although warning them they will probably encounter people who are much smarter than they, he encouraged freshman to be unafraid to admit their ignorance. More than 2,000 still await their Pell grant checks Although University of Utah classes began Monday, more than 2,000 students are still waiting to receive Pell te federal rule changes grant checks because of that delayed grant processing. Carl Buck, director of financial aids and scholarships, said despite staff working as fast as possible, validation of 3,600 applications and disbursement of checks is only one-thir- d complete. "The rules change hit us in late July when the validation process would ordinarily be well underway," he said. last-minu- "The changes created an unbelievable management problem, and it's going to take four to six more weeks to catch up with the backlog." "The check hasn't come, and I was told it could be another six weeks," said Sylvia Baker, a junior in psychology. "September is an expensive month. I had to move into an apartment and pay a deposit in addition to rent and tuition. It's not a good month to have $600 tied up. The delays have been especially hard on students this year, since they were asked to pay tuition Sept. 13, about two weeks before school started. In the past, the deadline has been Friday of the first week of school. Buck blamed the delays, which have affected students throughout the nation, on a changed attitude in the U. S. Department of Education. The department once focused on facilitating certification of eligibility and disbursement of checks. Now, says, Buck, the department has a "more austere perspective," and is intensifying scrutiny of applications and requiring more papers to prove need. Pell grants are the basic form of federal aid for needy undergraduate students. Most Pell recipients at the U. have family incomes under S 20,000 a year, and many are from families with much lower incomes. At the U. the average annual grant is $1,100. But since 1985-8- 6 tuition for a typical full-tituition is about S 1,470, most recipients must work or obtain other aid to cover the remainder of tuition, books, room, and me in-stud- ent continued on page four Non-Prof- it Org. U.S. Postage Paid Permit No. 1529 Salt Lake City, UT |