Friday

February 6, 1998

EDITORIAL

Your GPA does matter

In any given month an average student's expenses include rent, car payments, car insurance and gas -- and that's not counting the money many students have to set aside for books and registration fees.

Keeping one step ahead of bill collectors sometimes requires putting schoolwork on hold.

Not all students, however, can afford to let their GPA slip. Competition is fierce to enter graduate schools -- most noticably medical and law. At these schools a GPA of 3.0 or higher is the norm, not a pipe dream.

But in many fields all that is required of job applicants is a college diploma -- and even that is not a steadfast rule.

Mediocre grades, once frowned upon, have become the widely accepted norm. As a whole, students don't strive for excellence anymore. All they want, all that is required of them, is to scrape by.

After years of being beaten down by the seemingly insurmountable obstacle of maintaining finances, a strong GPA and a social life, most students have forgotten how good it feels to bring home a report card of which they can be proud.

What they have forgotten, what we have all forgotten, is that an education follows you through life, whether you like it or not -- reflecting strongly on your character. Long forgotten is the concept of learning for learning's sake.

Edith Hamilton, a writer and educator, said it best: "It has always seemed strange to me that in our endless discussions about education so little stress is ever laid on the pleasure of becoming an educated person, the enormous interest it adds to life."

Letters of Hope

Your pen can be a powerful tool

"When the first 200 letters came, the guards gave me back my clothes. When the next 200 came, the prison director came to see me. When the next pile of letters came, the director got in touch with his superior. The letters kept coming and coming, 3,000 of them. The president was informed. The letters still kept arriving and the president called the prison and told them to let me go." -- A released prisoner of conscience from the Dominican Republic.

Thousands of people are in prisons around the world because of their beliefs. Each week in the State Hornet, I will be telling where you can write to help these prisoners of conscience. My column will spotlight individuals and groups who are in dire need of your help. The column will also explain what Amnesty International is and the variety of methods it uses to save lives and relieve suffering.

Since its founding in 1961, Amnesty International membership has grown steadily to more than 1 million people from more than 150 countries and territories, all of whom believe that the sense of what is right and wrong is universal. The organization received worldwide recognition for its efforts in promoting global respect for human rights when it was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1977.

Specifically, Amnesty International works toward:

• The release of prisoners of conscience -- men, women and children imprisoned for their beliefs, color, sex, ethnic origin, language or religion, provided they have neither used nor advocated violence;
• Fair and prompt trials for all political prisoners;
• An end to torture, executions, political killings and "disappearances."

During the first six months of 1997, Amnesty International investigated human rights abuses in more than 35 countries, including Albania, Germany, India, Pakistan, Japan, Thailand, Guatemala, Colombia, Brazil, the United States, Kenya, Uganda, Tunisia, Israel and the occupied territories, and the Palestinian Authority.

This week I am asking you to write -- or photocopy and sign -- a letter to help six men who are suffering from a variety of medical problems resulting from their 10-year imprisonment in a Vietnamese prison.

The four Roman Catholic brothers and two Roman Catholic priests were arrested for expressing their religious beliefs.

You can pick up a sample letter at the Multi-Cultural Center at the Library. The letter explains all the details about the six men. If you would like to learn more about Amnesty International, you can look at their Web site (www.amnesty-usa.org) and read this column each week.

If you are interested in joining or assisting the organization, Clifford Anderson, a professor in the CSUS philosophy department, heads up the local Amnesty International chapter. He can be reached by calling 484-3741.