STAFF EDITORIAL

As administrators choose Dean McGee’s successor, it is imperative that they find a replacement who understands GS’ institutional mission so that the school remains attractive to future nontraditional students.

The changes made to this year’s FaCU process are welcome ones, but the hurdles that remain are ill-conceived. Come what may, the councils should let students draw their own conclusions from the deliberations, rather than try to manage public perceptions. Transparency should be a tool rather than a threat to student leaders, who, if they are making fair decisions, should have no objection to unqualified public scrutiny.

Students have long complained about the University's meal plans, and with good reason. At the end of each year, students are reduced to swinging by the dining hall whenever they can in hopes of getting their money's worth. If the Columbia and Barnard Dining Services make their meal plans less rigid, no student will feel pressured to run to John Jay for only an apple or a drink.

Students often have difficulty deciding where to enter calculus and language sequences, or whether to skip introductory courses with whose material they are already familiar. The University’s departments should offer online placement tests so students are better equipped to make these decisions.

This past week, Barnard College students received the exciting news that Mayor Michael Bloomberg will be delivering the keynote address at Barnard’s Commencement on May 20. Though some might be surprised by the mayor’s selection, Bloomberg is a fine choice of whom Barnard is rightly proud.

After spending decades in the shadow of spring 1968, when weeklong student demonstrations brought Columbia to a standstill, the University is moving into another era of its history. The passage of the protests’ fortieth anniversary should remind Columbia of the hard lessons it learned—chief among them, the need to guard against divisions strong enough to tear the campus apart. But the anniversary should bring an element of closure to a sequence of events whose legacy is fiercely contested even today.

Beginning tonight, many on campus are observing the 40th anniversary of the now-legendary week of protests against the Columbia administration. Whereas the more nuanced of the scheduled gatherings aim to provide valuable historical perspective, events commemorating the protesters might succumb to the assumption that 1968 had only positive effects on balance. Those in attendance should work to appreciate the complexity of the historical consequences of spring 1968.

While Bacchanal’s April 21 spring concert has been hailed by many students as an improvement over those of previous years, the event’s small crowd and haphazard ticketing methods testify to disorganization and poor advertising on the part of its planners. Bacchanal should redouble its efforts to generate excitement and spirit among the student population through more ambitious and better publicized programming beyond the annual concert.

On April 15, Lehman Lawn was abuzz with music, barbecue, and even fireworks as Barnard students celebrated their annual Spirit Day. Columbia, on the other hand, does not have its own Spirit Day—this is both a symptom and a cause of the palpable lack of community on campus.

Columbia should dissuade its students from entrusting their belongings to the self-proclaimed “very best in collegiate shipping and storage.” What’s more, it should keep Collegeboxes off of College Walk.