News

Cambridge Residents Slam Council Proposal to Delay Bike Lane Construction

News

‘Gender-Affirming Slay Fest’: Harvard College QSA Hosts Annual Queer Prom

News

‘Not Being Nerds’: Harvard Students Dance to Tinashe at Yardfest

News

Wrongful Death Trial Against CAMHS Employee Over 2015 Student Suicide To Begin Tuesday

News

Cornel West, Harvard Affiliates Call for University to Divest from ‘Israeli Apartheid’ at Rally

Class Cuts

WELLESLEY

NO WRITER ATTRIBUTED

Stocks Listed in January Portfolio Violate College South Africa Policy

Stocks with low Sullivan Principles ratings listed in Wellesley College's portfolio violate the investment policy the college adopted in the fall of 1985, The Wellesley News reported.

The investment policy, which the college reaffirmed last year, states that all companies in which the school invested that do business in South Africa must be making progress toward full implementation of the Sullivan Principles.

Companies are rated by the Sullivan Principles according to the degree to which they adhere to desegregation, fair employment practices, and equal pay for equal work. According to Wellesley's present investment policy, no companies can have a rating on the low, "III" level.

But according to the student newspaper, the college in January held stock in Raytheon Corporation and the Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company, firms which both received III level Sullivan ratings.

Raytheon received a III level rating for its South African subsidiary, Rockplan Ltd, in a report released last December. Goodyear's rating slipped to the low level from a higher rating it had received last year, The Wellesley News reported.

Last April the college divested of more than $91,000 invested in the Ferro Corporation because of its III level rating. But since then, it has not divested of stock in any company because of a low Sullivan rating. UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN

School Radio Station Shut After Airing Racist Jokes

Administrators at the University of Michigan have closed down campus radio station WJJX following student protest of a broadcast containing a series of racist and sexist jokes.

The student disc jockey, who was fired from his job before the shut-down, reportedly had two people phone in the racial slurs to his weekly program, The Michigan Daily reported.

The jokes included: "Who are the two most famous black women in history?....Aunt Jemima and motherfucker," and "Why do Black people small?....so blind people can hate them, too."

Students who heard the show prepared a statement protesting the program and played a tape of the show for the university's highest ranking Black administrator, the campus daily reported.

"I think there's no excuse for this type of behavior. There's no such thing as a big joke in this situation," the official said after shutting down WJJX. PRINCETON

More Women Than Ever Apply

A record number of women have applied to Princeton's class of 1991 in the university's third-largest applicant pool ever.

But the overall number of completed application for admission to the class of '91 dropped to 12,069 from last year's 12,244 applicants. The largest applicant pool ever was 12,718 who applied to the class of '88 the paper reported.

The number of women applicants to the class of '91, which made up 41.5 percent of the poor beats the previous high of 39.1 percent who applied to the class of '89, according to The Daily Princetonian.

Officials at Princeton have taken credit for the recent increase. "We attempted to recruit women energetically this fall, and from the increased female applicant numbers one could conclude that the increase is due to our recruitment efforts," Princeton's Dean of Admission Anthony Cummings told the campus daily. GEORGETOWN

Divestment Had Little Impact, Treasurer Says

Four months after Georgetown University decided on a policy of divestment from South Africa-linked companies, the effects of the approximately $17 million divestment from the $175 million endowment remain disputed.

Although campus activists initially hailed the university's decision as a moral victory against the injustices of apartheid, the Georgetown administrator responsible for the endowment, Vice President and Treasurer George R. Houston said he thought the university's divestment had only a symbolic importance.

Divested funds will be reinvested to create a portfolio free of South African ties without sustaining severe losses in the rate of return, Houston told The Hoya.

A boycott of products from controversial companies would have a greater effect than divestment, Houston told the paper, but he questioned whether students would be willing to make the sacrifice.

"Would [students] give up drinking Coca-Cola and driving General Motors car? Many of them I saw get in a General Motors car and drive off the campus after they'd been complaining about GM in South Africa," Houston said. UNIVERSITY OF MASSACHUSETTS

Students Win Struggle To Replace Renowned Maze

Officials at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst have agreed to student demands to replace the Maze, a beloved labyrinth of chain-link fence on the outskirts of the campus.

In September of last year, the University decided to tear down the nine-year-old sculpture after artist Richard Fleischner, who presented the Maze to the University in 1978, expressed dismay at the condition of his work during a campus visit.

The artist proposed repairs to the sagging fences that would total $50,000, too much for the UMass administration, which decided to destroy the structure instead of rebuilding it.

But student opposition to demolishing the structure was unexpectedly strong. Students Joel Rabinowitz and Joseph Demeo, cofounders of the "Save the Maze Coalition," gathered approximately 2500 signatures in a petition drive, and then placed the issue on a student referendum in which 90 percent of those surveyed supported keeping the maze.

In response to the students' wishes, UMass will tear down the old structure and replace it with a new maze designed by a UMass student chosen by competition.

"Almost every student has gone through the maze at least once during his four year at UMass," said Rabinowitz. "It's become a tradition," he said.

Want to keep up with breaking news? Subscribe to our email newsletter.

Tags