Illustration by Josh Hagler

Tuesday August 21, 2001 |

Monday, thousands of students walked the cramped hallways of the biggest-talking, smallest-stick-carrying student union in the United States for the first time. The erection of millions of dollars of new-age composites and steel beams amidst our world-famous mall emoted no O-faces. Moreover, while piles of the Benjamins were dropped into that corporate cauldron, the UA continues to experience a brain drain.

Universities nationwide are afraid - afraid of losing precious academics to the private sector or higher-paying private institutions. However, whereas fear is a conduit to brainstorming and digging to find the necessary funds to retain and hire new, great professors at other schools, the UA merely seeks to console the university community while employing unknowns or leaving teaching positions empty.

Just this summer, Donna Guy, a premier academic in Latin American Studies, left the UA for a job paying $40,000 more per year at Ohio State. On average, UA professors are paid 40% less than teachers at other schools, according to Elizabeth Ervin, vice provost for academic affairs.

Three weeks before school started, Jory Hancock, chair of the UA faculty senate, told Wildcat reporter Daniel Scarpinato that "bricks and mortar are about people. People who ask for bricks and mortar have the same motivation as anyone else, which is to make this a better place to learn for the students."

I haven't had the time to buy the most recent US News and World Report, but the last time I looked at their college rankings, there wasn't a column for "pretty buildings" or "mastadonic student unions." Great professors make great students. University of Pennsylvania students call the Philly ghetto home, Princeton is in New Jersey for crying out loud, and even the greatest of Ivy League schools have buildings in disrepair. UA students live in no-cloud-all-sun-hot-people-everywhere land. Buildings are already down the totem pole of wants - and especially needs - here.

Sadly, our money pit of a union seems to have never had the students in mind. While more shops and stores flood what has become the memorial shopping center, seating has declined, student-interest areas are absent, and the beloved Cellar is no more. We, as students, have whored our comfortable home for increased rental prices.

Now, my compadres, check this ass of a deal out.

Since the 1990s, the state of Arizona has been decreasing educational spending. In fact, Arizona is playing caboose, being ranked 50th among US states in public-education spending. Now, Ervin indicates that the UA "will seek a reasonable tuition increase." What Madame Ervin has failed to realize is that the gaping money trap located on the northwest corner of the mall was our education money misspent. The scenario is simple: if Joe Shmo University pays Professor X more money, they are going to leave. We pay Joe Shmo Construction what Professor X needs to stay. Bye bye Professor. Hello dumber students and decreased application numbers that grant the UA the ability to charge higher tuition. Jeepers, this sure does smell like feces.

So, what now? The Union is already being paid for, and teachers aren't pulling the bills they need. Furthermore, we, as students, remain financially po'. We can't even afford the 'or at the end, nevertheless a tuition increase. The state has an infinitesimal $5 million retention fund, but that's for UA, NAU and that septic tank of a northern rival, ASU. With thousands of teaching positions spread amongst the big three, funding equates to roughly Jack Squat. If the state wasn't willing to float $40K to blue-chip Donna Guy's way, where is the cash flow going to stem from?

While a great education does cost money, other state universities are doing a good job in keeping great teachers and stable tuitions. A tuition increase of $1000 per each of UA's roughly 36,000 students would amount to an extra $36,000,000 per academic calendar year. In that situation the university is saved and loan companies win. Everything's okay now, right? Wrong. Students don't all have pockets that deep. It's too easy of an answer for the administration to drop on the students, especially considering the unruly doling of funds to build monolithic fast-food emporiums.

More building plans are in the works for things we as students and a university community don't need nearly as much as our esteemed faculty. What good is a state-of-the-art classroom with no teacher to hold a class in it? I'll tell you: NONE! Administrators, please heed the needs of this student body. Mortar and metal don't teach, teachers teach.