Your turn
A sampling of reader reaction to recent issues of the UC Santa Cruz Review. E-mail us at review@ucsc.edu.
'State of confusion' confusion
I am confused after reading "State of confusion." Do you think that presenting the something-for-nothing viewpoint of the GOP and the Tea Party movement will ingratiate yourself to their modest thought processes? Or maybe it's their pocketbooks that you are appealing to? The fair and balanced reporting of Faux News is not what I what I expect from a university publication.
Proposition 13 and other such initiatives passed by popular support are symbols of failure and poor governance. A representative government that plays second fiddle to mob rule (initiative polling) is not a sustainable vehicle for the people or institutions of California.
—Peter Burkett (Merrill '78)
Granite Falls, Wash.
After reading the discussion between Laird and Morgan I was shocked by the figure Morgan claimed that California has $500 billion (and growing) unfunded public pension obligations. Was that the correct figure or was it supposed to be $500 million? If it's the correct amount, we are so screwed.
—Kevin Kelem
Santa Cruz, Calif.
Ed. note: $500 billion is correct, according to the Stanford Institute for Economic Research. Read a report about the study.
Don't just feed us feel-good stories
Review is not what it could be. For many of us, it's the only regular contact that we have with the university. I'm really not looking for a bunch of feel-good stories. I can deal with a few, but not a whole magazine.
At least some alumni are looking for a little more than the typical corporate PR approach to communication. An example of where the Review really falls short is having the narrative evaluation decision by the Academic Senate buried at the end on the Alumni Notes page ("Narrative evaluations become instructor optional"). To my mind, it should have been up front as it represents for many of us a significant loss of UCSC's heritage and soul.
—Michael S. Brown (Crown '74)
Paper view
I spend eight hours a day in front of a computer for work (and have done so for 20-plus years), and when I get done with that, I simply do not want to read another sentence on a screen. For me, the online version of the UCSC Review was simply a no-go. Thanks for bringing back the paper!
—Lisa Schaechter (Crown '83)
I was pleasantly surprised to read your comments about the "value of the printed word" ("From the editor"), especially in a publication such as this. I understand the financial difficulties we are all faced with and appreciate that you were able to reallocate funding to allow the Review to be produced. I do find the Internet helpful and it has its place, but being able to hold this publication and read through it … the web site is a distant substitution.
—Robert Kemp
Director of Print, Mail & Receiving Services, UCSC
The other meaning of 'green revolution'
The title of the article "Cathy Calfo: An advocate of the green revolution" could be interpreted in a wrong way since the term "green revolution" has been associated with industrialized monocrops, highly dependent on chemicals and so destructive of the environment and agriculturalists who worked on such lands.
—Guillermo Delgado-P.
Anthropology, UCSC
