As I get to know the university more, the more confused I get about the goals of this university’s administration. Take the whole idea behind the two-hundred-and-some-odd-dollar student activity fee. Why can’t students add the athletic events they would like to see by presenting their student ID and purchasing season tickets at a student discount? I can offer a guess. Athletics programs would suffer, because not that many students would be purchasing season tickets.

Here is another example of poor cost accounting. The sociology and geography departments put up somewhere near $40,000 to build a small computer center for students. How many students use it? Well, for one thing, it’s closed to the public. Another thing is that the calendar on the door only says it’s reserved for one class on Tuesdays in April. In total, one class a month uses it for four, maybe five, days of that month. That is a serious misuse of public money.

Whether I am truly well informed on SDSU’s policies does not change the idea behind the principle of efficiency. Students should always be well served by their university. After all, many young people forgo jobs and life experiences to gain additional training at universities that have long shown diminishing returns after a four-year degree.

It was obvious from the very start of last year’s interviewing process who would be SDSU’s next president. Everyone who makes policy decisions, regarding this university, cannot be dissuaded from choosing a candidate that will maintain the status quo for operations at this university. This way, everything will continue to run smooth and unchanged. But the real question is … do you (the student) want things to remain unchanged?

Phillip KauffmanEconomics graduate student