4A
October 17, 2014
The News
Opinion
Opinion Editor: Carly Besser Phone: 270-809-5873
Our View
Davies’ donation creates opportunities The staff editorial is the majority opinion of The Murray State News Editorial Board.
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In addition to tuition, Murray State relies on outside donations from alumni and former staff to keep its doors open. Some alumni, new and old, receive calls asking for donations to the University, despite already owing thousands in student loans. Because the burden of funding the University falls largely on us, we think it is gracious that President Bob Davies, his wife Cindy and daughter Katie made a $117,000 donation gift in support of student scholarships, academic enhancements and various student needs at the University. Davies, whose salary at Murray State is approximately $300,000, sacrificed more than a third of his yearly paycheck to support a University that he has overseen for less than one semester. This donation speaks volumes when compared to presidents of other Kentucky universities that have
Garrison: I lived to see 8
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schools. We should feel extremely lucky to have a president who, even though he has a smaller salary than presidents at competing Kentucky colleges, believes enough in the success of this University to put a large amount of his own money on the line. His fiscal generosity is something the University has not seen in a president since 1922 when President Rainey T. Wells fundraised approximately $117,000 from 1,100 donors. By donating toward scholarships, Davies is relieving the student debt that many of us face. On average, Murray State students graduate with $20,644 worth of student loan debt. Most of us rely on financial aid assistance and taking out student loans to attend college, so more opportunities for scholarships are something we are eager to
see. With more scholarship incentives, we have more chances to escape growing student loan payments. Western Kentucky’s $5,000 gift will do little to assist students who average $26,110 in debt, which is the fourth highest average debt amount behind Kentucky State, Morehead State University and Eastern Kentucky University. Besides his donation, students on campus are used to seeing Davies involved on campus. We often see him interacting with us on campus, inviting us to luncheons at Winslow Dining Hall and attending sporting events. There was never a question that Davies strived to improve relations between himself and the student body, but his large donation is a display of his willingness to see both the University and its students succeed.
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held their positions for years. Western Kentucky University President Gary Ransdell donated just $5,000 to his university, which seems meager when you take his his $427,824 salary into account. He graduated from Western Kentucky in 1973 and has remained president since 1997. Kentucky State University Interim President Raymond Burse donated more than $90,000 of his salary to raise the university employee hourly wage to $10.25 an hour. His current salary is $349,869. Although donating to their universities is commendable, there are many perks to being a university president. Some presidents are given free housing and transportation in their contracts. This, along with a six-figure salary, should influence the donation of presidents at competitive
I remember very little of my early childhood. From my birth until I was 12 years old is kind of a blur, but there are always moments that will stick with me forever. One of these involved Y2K. I remember watching the news about how Zac Garrison the world was Senior from ending and I was pretty bummed, Franklin, Ky. because Pokemon Gold and Silver were set to release in October and I was upset I wouldn’t live to see the glory of 100 new Pokemon. I remember sitting in a room, waiting for the moments up to January 1, 2000 and seeing my mother cry. My family was tense and being a little more sentimental than normal. The news told us the world was ending and we should be afraid – that everything we knew and depended on would be changed or destroyed and I would die a 7 year old. I remember how somber the environment was as that clock ticked to midnight and how silent it was. We were waiting for something terrible to
happen, but we had no clue what. A few long minutes went by and then we started to cheer. My mother’s tears turned into tears of joy and my brothers hugged each other harder than they ever have before. And the sweetest thing of all – I’d live to see 8. Fear mongering runs rampant in today’s media because of one simple fact: fear sells. People are more likely to click a link about something they are terrified of or more likely to tune in to the nightly news when a terrifying story is on. Today’s society is overstimulated and over entertained, so we are no longer interested in the news. We value things that evoke emotions and stimulate us instead of educate us. We’re less worried about knowing the truth and more interested in the reality show that the media turns everyday events into. Information doesn’t sell. The truth doesn’t cause a spike in the ratings and justice doesn’t put money into anyone’s pockets. So in today’s for-profit media syndicate, what motivates the media to inform? People are scared of what they don’t know. Let’s use the Ebola crisis for example. The average American has a small idea what Ebola actually is. We only know what the media has told us about it, which is that it is deadly and coming for us. We say we want to be informed and to know more about this deadly disease, but when a scientific article pops up on our newsfeed about the reality of Ebola we will skip over it for the column that is titled, “Ebola is turning people into zombies in Africa” with
a picture of a “Walking Dead” zombie as the thumbnail. People are scared of both zombies and Ebola, so they click and read a poorly written article about how somebody apparently heard from a friend of a friend that they might have seen an Ebola victim move in a body bag. Then we share it on Facebook so all of our friends can also be scared. The government should be in place to protect us. Not only our physical state, but it has a duty as our government to protect our peace of mind, too. It allows the media to keep us terrified of our own shadows so we stay inside as they feed us lukewarm, freeze-dried propaganda through a tube. We shouldn’t have to be scared. We deserve to be informed. There are so many things in the world we need to know and hear about, but they are drowned out by the soap opera that the local news channel has become. The best thing you can do is to try and find alternative news sources. Some say that finding a neutral news source is like finding an honest politician, but the search for truth never hurt anyone. Knowledge is most powerful weapon you can ever equip yourself with. You deserve to educate yourself on realities, not distract yourself with theories. Concrete facts are sometimes hard to swallow. The truth is rough. Some would rather divert their attention to something that is abstract instead of accepting the reality of something that is concrete and proven. We owe it to ourselves to know the truth. Go and find it.