Caveat borrower

We have three rules for our children, should they decide to take a year or two off from their studies:

1. Don't get arrested.
2. Don't procreate.
3. Don't get into debt.

I.E. don't let yourself go too far down a path from which there is no retreat, and for which you will be responsible for the rest of your lives.

All well and good, and the rules could just as well apply to students in college as well, we think. Which explains why we are not particularly happy about the news that the College Board is in the business of private loans for college students. Crippling debt is one of the most intractable problems that bedevils those of us who really care about students; private loans typically have higher interest rates and less forgiving payoff schedules than Federal loans. The College Board does not belong in this business.

It's one heckuva town

Bloomington, that is. And now we've got our own magazine to celebrate it.

Worth a gamble?

Props to Governor Daniels for trying to come up with ways to support higher education in the state of Indiana. However, we are reminded that our sister calls state lotteries "a tax on the stupid." Ironic then, we suppose, that the monies generated would be used to support the smart. What do you think? Has the governor gone too far with privatization? Wasn't the money supposed to go to education anyway? Shoudl the state be in the business of promoting a potentially devastating, addictive activity like gambling? If not, have you got a better idea for funding higher education?

Silent nights...

Shhhhh... it is finals week for IU students, and the place is really starting to quiet down. Traffic is thinning out, and it is easier to park downtown. Next week, the students will mostly be gone except those few who live too far from home to travel for the holidays, especially students from abroad who have enough trouble getting a visa to attend IU in the first place. We're going to feed some of them at least one holiday dinner; on Monday night at the Herman B Wells Library, we fed 1,200 of them a free and healthy snack, and wished them best of luck on their exams.

Blue, blue, their world is blue

Our kids call the winter solstice holiday "Christma-Hanu-Kwanzaa," declining to differentiate between the annual getting of the presents. But apparently lots of people - especially male people - can't see any difference either. Interesting!

More on financial aid

This is huge. For students who get Pell grants, IU is going to cover the rest of the costs of tuition and fees, leaving only books, supplies and living expenses. Read the whole thing here. Of course, living expenses are a large part of the cost of attending college, but smart students can find lots of ways to keep those costs down as well.

Those goofy college kids...

...or in this case, it is a recent IU alum, seeking to gain fame through t-shirts.

Race and education

and everything else... For some well-written and thoughtful commentary from a different perspective, we recommend this blog.

Objective: Remove filler from resumes...

Here is a link to a fascinating discussion about job applicant resumes, started by blogger and law professor Eugene Volokh.

If law firms can reasonably require single-page resumes from second-year law students, we think the same is possible for students in their last year of high school.

Some choice remarks from the discussion:

• College students also get a lot of screwy advice. I was pretty much ordered to include an "Objective" on my resume, and I still don't know what good it's supposed to do. At least the keywords list will help with scanned resumes... but who even reads the objective, anyway?
• I've found the same rule applies to people who say they are "quick learners", or that they have "good interpersonal skills" or "good math skills" or "knowledge of Excel." (I work in quantitative finance, and I'm currently trying to hire a C++ programmer, so, I'm seeing a lot of these). If they say that, then no, they aren't. The people who really know something don't bother to put such vague or low-level skills. The people who say they have "good math skills" usually got a B in their one calculus class 10 years ago. The people who are actually good might list a published paper or a couple courses in real analysis, but if asked they will say they are dissatisfied with their math skills.
• A 2L going through on-campus recruiting at a top school with a multi-page resume is going to look like an idiot.

We're not sayin'... we just sayin'.

News of the day

In our opinion, it was a case of either they had to charge him with a crime or give him a medal. The IU student who pointed out an airline security loophole isn't going to get into any trouble. Let's hope the FBI offers him a job!

We're back

We've been remiss lately, but really it's because the weather has been so unseasonably glorious around here. Thanksgiving Day in Bloomington, and the temperature was in the mid-60's...

However, goodbye to all that. They say the weather is going to turn nasty and cold, and just in time for the end of the semester too. Probably better for keeping the students indoors and focussed on their studies. Check with your student - this is the time of year when lots of them run low on meal points. Remind them that the first night of finals week (Monday, Dec. 11) there will be free food in the Herman B Wells Library, courtesy of the College of Arts and Sciences. 10 p.m. - be there.

Here's hoping!

Readers of this blog will know that we are big fans of the IU football coach, Terry Hoeppner. Today is the IU-Purdue game, and our son is off to West Lafayette with a bunch of friends, to cheer on the Hoosiers. If IU wins today, that means the first trip to a bowl game since 1993. That is one long post-season drought.

So here's to IU, to Coach Hep, and to the Hoosier team. Bring home the Old Oaken Bucket!

The Admissions game

If you are reading this, then you probably have at least one child already in college. Remember the application and decision-making process? Wasn't that fun? For this year's students and parents, suddenly the received wisdom has changed.

Our take is this: if you are 17 or 18 years old and you cannot keep your resume of awards and activities to one side of a single sheet of paper, well, frankly... we agree with the person quoted in that article. When do you sleep? Have you slept at all in the past four years? Had any fun? More to the point, what will happen when you get to college? Will you do the "crash-and-burn" or will you keep going at this frantic rate?

Our father was a university professor and the best piece of advice he ever gave us was this: "Enjoy these years and take advantage of the whole range of experiences that are open to you. Have some fun." And this, mind you, was when we were starting our junior year. Of high school.

Sign of the times

It had to happen... Starbucks opened a store on campus today, its "first" one at IU, according to the paper. Wonder how many they plan?

No one loves Starbucks more than we do, but we are beginning to think our son was right, the one who said: "Pretty soon they are going to open Starbucks inside of Starbucks."

Martinsville reconsidered

We have a fondness for lemon drops - especially the hard-to-find old-fashioned sour kind that you used to buy for a penny apiece and eat out of a little white paper sack. We found some of those yesterday in a most unexpected place - downtown Martinsville - as we made a spontaneous detour on the way home from Indianapolis.

We grew up in Bloomington and have made the trip around Martinsville countless times on our way elsewhere, but yesterday was our first time ever venturing into this tiny (population ~13,000) and relatively poverty-stricken metropolis. Our first time! Say "Martinsville" to almost anyone in Bloomington and the reaction will inevitably be: "Ku Klux Klan." Granted, there was a notorious killing there in the 60's that had strong racial overtones. There are also countless apocryphal stories told by people who have passed through the place (and by people who know people who said they passed through the place, if you catch our drift), about racist comments and threats they received. There may be some truth to these rumors, but consider for a moment that the town's terrible reputation may not be entirely deserved. After all, it is hardly the only place in the country where racist events are known to have taken place, nor is it the worst.

More to the point, Martinsville has a lot of - dare we say it - charm to recommend it to tourists. We parked on the square and walked past several curio and gift shops on our way to Ruby's Diner, where we had lunch (GREAT onion rings - another one of our culinary weaknesses). Friendly service, too. We weren't the only ones there and in fact we ran into a colleague who works at the IU School of Medicine, enjoying lunch there with her mother. Many of the downtown stores feature books and products touting favorite son John Wooden.

Coach Wooden was born in Martinsville in 1910 and played hoops for Martinsville High. Paul V. McNutt, the former governor of Indiana whose name graces one of the more popular residence halls at IU, is another native of the town .

Who knew? The place has four or five excellent antiques shops, including the old jailhouse, which has been converted into Jail Bird Antiques, complete with a tea room. And it is not the only tea room in town. There is even a tiny artists' colony beginning to take root.

Our favorite find of the day has to have been the Martinsville Candy Kitchen, also located on the square. That's where we found the lemon drops that we've been happily sucking on ever since. Their signature product is hand-made candy canes, but they also make many chocolate products, as well as a variety of fudge. We can't eat chocolate but we bought some fudge to bring home for the kids. The owner heard us talking as we paid for our purchases and pointed out a bag of lemon candy he had made. Looks like small bits of yellow candy cane, but he promised us it was all lemon-flavored and not lemony-mint. We bought the bag (for a whopping $1.49) and once we have made our way through the lemon drops, we are looking forward to that treat.

As we took our change, the young woman who rang up our purchases said, "You come back and see us soon." And we plan to... those are some tasty lemon drops.

Wonder if they celebrate Festivus...

Religious blasphemy or legal loophole? You decide.

Who's YOUR SecDef?

We mean: Hoosier SecDef. Robert Gates, who will be taking over from Donald Rumsfeld as President Bush's Secretary of Defense, has a degree from IU.

Indiana's 9th Congressional District

Bloomington lies in one of those hotly contested districts they've been talking so much about. Democrat Baron Hill is trying to regain the seat he lost to Republican Mike Sodrel two years ago.
We voted first thing this morning, and we mean FIRST THING - we were at our polling place at 6:02 a.m. And we were happy to see a young friend of ours, call him M, who is an IU senior this year and who is working at the polling place all day today.

The polling place was clean, large, well-lit, well-organized, with plenty of available parking; lines were already forming at 6 a.m. despite a driving rain; voting was fast and peaceable. The machines seemed to work just fine. Here's hoping things go as well all over the country.

You make me wanna DANCE

Zowie. This year's IU dance marathon participants raised a more than $920,000 for Riley Children's Hospital. This is a record for the annual fund raising event!

Will blog for planet

IU associate professor of biophysics and all-around brain-y guy John Beggs has joined the blogosphere, keeping his finger on the pulse of the planet.

Making us proud to be Hoosiers

We hope you clicked through all those news stories about the student who exposed a loophole in airline security procedures. He's an IU student!

Will they go to the polls?

On Election Day 2000 we stood in line for 2 hours and 45 minutes to vote. You read that correctly - 2 hours and 45 minutes. We vote in a gerrymandered precinct that includes many student residences, and the line was enormous. In the next precinct over there are almost no student residents, and the wait to vote was about ten minutes.

As you might expect, we got to chatting with our neighbors in the line, some of whom were students. We were pleasantly surprised that they stuck out the long wait to vote, but dismayed to hear them say they didn't realize voting took so long. We had never ever had to stand so long in line to vote before (heck - we don't think we've had to stand in line that long to do ANYthing before!) and we tried to encourage the students by telling them it is not always such a long wait. And we pleaded with them not to be turned off to voting by their experience. They were patient as saints.

We are in the heart of Sodrel-Hill country, Indiana's 9th Congressional District and one of the most hotly contested Congressional races in the country. The president himself was in the district the other day, stumping for the incumbent Republican. We love politics, and we're looking forward to Nov. 7. It will be interesting to see if the students turn out for this one too.

Who knew?

Here is an interesting headline from today's Chronicle of Higher Education:
"Liberal 'Groupthink' Puts Professors at Odds With Most Americans, Report Says"

Some of the major points of the report, per the Chronicle:

Professors are three times as likely to call themselves "liberal" as
"conservative." In the 2004 presidential election, 72 percent of those surveyed voted for John Kerry.
Almost one-third of professors cite the United States as among the top two greatest threats to international stability -- more than cited Iran, China, or Iraq.
Fifty-four percent of professors say U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East is partially responsible for the growth of Islamic militancy.

You can read the whole thing here.

Body art on the wane? We can only hope!

The best way to kill a customer's appetite is to have the server or the waiter present themselves with an unusual piercing - the eyebrow is bad enough, but the two things we really can't stomach are the tongue stud and the nose ring on the barrista that looks like it belongs on a bull. The latter is, simply put, disgusting, while the former is distractingly awkward and painful-looking. And now here's proof that it's a bad idea. Maybe it's just us, but we think (thankfully!) that the piercings fad seems to be fading. Now if we could only say the same thing about tattoos . We read somewhere that 25 percent of Americans between the ages of 18 and 50 have tattoos. Permanent ones. Twenty FIVE percent! We also saw that New Yorker cartoon showing the subtext of every tattoo, to wit: "Ask me about my parents' divorce." Does anything scream, "Take me seriously! Hire me!" less than a tattoo?

Didn't see this coming!

Well, well, well. There is a t-shirt that is very popular around B-ton: The front says "Dry campus"; the back continues: "My a##". We suppose sales of this type of t-shirt may drop off soon. Turns out the campus is a bit damp.

Easy credit + college costs = crushing debt?

Although today's ids article focuses on graduate student debt, it nonetheless highlights a growing problem for ALL students.

The facts of the matter are that many students must take out loans to finance their educations and all students - undergraduate, graduate and professional school students alike - are easy prey for credit card companies. As our kids learn how to delay gratification, they also need to learn this hard truth: Easy credit can mean long-term hardship.

Campus style watch

Last year it was all bared bellies all the time; this year the layered look is in. Female students are wearing long, clingy undershirts under shorter clingy shirts or cropped jackets. Sweatpants are still over-long for both males and females. Of course the ever-popular flip-flops are ubiquitous for both sexes, which is fine on a day like to day when it is sunny and 75 in Bloomington. We will never understand how these kids endure life in flip-flops all winter long, but that's what they do, all in the name of fashion, we suppose...

IU faculty approve requirements for all students

Surprisingly - and sometimes to the consternation of incoming freshmen - IU has not had this sort of thing until now. From our point of view, these new requirements look very close to what the College of Arts and Sciences requires of all its majors. Here is the meat of it:

Required common ground courses include three credits of English
composition, three to four credits of mathematical modeling, six credits of arts and humanities, six credits of social and historical studies, and five to six credits of natural and mathematical sciences. Also included is a requirement to complete the second-year level of a world language or six credits in world culture courses, or an approved study-abroad experience.

There is more:

Shared goals include intensive writing experiences, information fluency, diversity in the United States and some type of enriching educational experience, such as an internship, a capstone project, student teaching, an honors thesis, or a musical recital or performance.

A few things are not clear to us, but we'll keep you posted as things develop:

• What is meant by "diversity in the United States" as a "shared goal"? Does this mean all students must take some sort of class that emphasizes diversity?
• When do these new requirements go into effect?

Why college is so much fun, Part 1

Important people from all walks of life come to campus to speak, and everyone gets riled up. Students have so much energy for this kind of thing. Expect a war of words on the letters page of the ids for weeks after this.

If you can't beat 'em, join 'em

Every student seems to have a cell phone these days, which sometimes causes problems in the classroom. Dave Baker, IU's celebrated professor of jazz studies, has hit on a way to make the sound of the cell phone into music to our ears.

Good news

Football Coach Terry Hoeppner got a clean bill of health and has re-joined his Hoosiers. And not a moment too soon - the team was 2-0, then went 0-2 while the coach was out recuperating from brain surgery.

Wonders never cease...

The ids (Indiana Daily Student) came out in favor of a tuition increase announced by the provost last week. Do you agree???

Or do you agree with the US secretary of education that: ‘higher education has become … at times self-satisfied and unduly expensive.’ ? Read more.

Don't worry - it's a separate budget

Athletics is proposing to spend $55 million to add and upgrade some of the sports facilities on campus. The budget for Athletics is mostly separate from the budget for the rest of the institution. What do you think? Is it worth it to spend this amount on sports facilities?

Hey - good news - one of the presenters at the IU Trustees meeting was football coach Terry Hoeppner, a week removed from surgery on his brain. Hep says he is doing well and plans to re-join his Hoosier team by Sunday. Welcome back, Coach!

Don't say you weren't warned

Most freshmen don't know this, but IU has an advising center for students who plan to go to medical school or law school. Here's word from the director: The first year in professional school is supposed to be difficult and intimidating. Read the whole thing.

The Health Professions and Pre-Law Center is a great resource - tell your kids about it!

Further proof

Youth really is wasted on the young. In case you were not already jealous enough of your college-age offspring, this online newsletter may do the trick. Live at IU boasts that it offers "A varietal feast of arts, entertainment, and other offerings."

Another newsletter, Active for Life, keeps you up on all the health and fitness-related news and activities at IU.

Teach your children well

Normally we would urge parents of college students not to hover around, but to let your children off their leashes a bit more than many of us are accustomed to these days. However, today is not a normal day - Elvira's cousin lost a son in a traffic accident on Thursday; the son was just 21 years old. And there is another report of students being shot, this time at Duquesne in Pennsylvania. That's the second campus shooting this month; never mind all the reports of shootings and real plans for real violence and mayhem at high schools around the country. There was even a high school student here in Bloomington who was arrested the other day and charged with bringing a gun to school.

We just called our kids to tell them we love them, and to remind them to drive very carefully all the time.

Since we're all concerned about safety, we'll admit that we've gotten some complaints from students about long waits for the campus escort service. This is a volunteer, student-run service that provides a ride home or a walking escort for anyone who does not feel comfortable walking back to the dorm alone at night. However, they do get over-booked and they can take a long time to show up - remind your kids this is not an emergency service! In an emergency, tell your kids to call 9-1-1, even from a cell phone.

Do you know why most public phones have big stickers that say EMERGENCY 9-1-1 in bold red letters? Because in an emergency people have been known to forget the number. They will even say, "I can't remember the number for 9-1-1." At least that's what they told us during IU's emergency training.

Get well soon, Coach Hep!

IU's popular football coach, Terry Hoeppner, is having surgery tomorrow. Hoeppner's Hoosier team is 2-0 this season. Coach Hep has been a team player and a terrific IU booster since his arrival in Bloomington not so very long ago. We wish him a speedy return to health and to the sidelines.

Meet the parents

Greetings. Our names are Elvis and Elvira; we are both parents of current IU students; we are also employees of IU and both of us have other connections to the institution as well. We will share posting and moderating duties for this blog, so sometimes you'll get Elvis's point of view and at other times Elvira will weigh in. If we disagree, you might get both of us.

So... welcome. If you've never read or used a blog before, the purpose is to share ideas, information and concerns. You are invited to send us your questions, your comments, your criticism... heck - your praise, if you have any. While we have the blessing of the powers that be to offer this forum and while we plan to moderate contributions for offensive language (which we define as anything that would get you a warning from the chair umpire in a USTA-sanctioned tennis match), this is YOUR forum. Or "forum and against 'em" as we used to say back in journalism school.

To get the conversation started we'll pose a couple of questions to you, with a nod to former New York City Mayor Ed Koch:

• How are we doing?
• Are your kids OK at IU?
• Did move-in and Welcome Week go smoothly?
• How about the first week of classes?
• In other words, how are we doing?