We present our weekly review of selected student columnists and opinion writers, a number of whom continue to write over their summer break. In this edition, they analyze the recent debt compromise in Congress, dubious ways of paying your college tuition, diversity and affirmative action policies and the value of a liberal arts education.
- Despite the ongoing national debt crisis, a lousy economy, over consumption of imported oil, deteriorating schools and a growing wealth gap, Americans continue to fall flat on their political faces and avoid taking the obvious way out, says a summertime commentator for the Stanford Daily.
- The editors of the Daily Illini believe that the recent mass killings in Norway indicate that religiously motivated terrorism is not confined to Islam.
- On the same story, the op ed staff of the Daily Nebraskan find lots to criticize in the major media’s coverage of it.
- A writer for the Purdue Exponent thinks that there’s got to be better ways to finance your educational expenses than the one some of her peers seem to be using increasingly.
- The dynamic between today’s college students and their parents is much different than it used to be, says a columnist for the Daily Kansan. And since they’re never going to understand some of things you do at school, you can’t really be honest with them.
- A summer columnist for the Michigan Daily weighs competing views of “diversity” and affirmative action policies at U of M.
- Dartmouth College needs to maintain its traditional devotion to a strong liberal arts education, and decline the advice of those calling for a more “practical” orientation, says a staffer for The Dartmouth.
- Using the slower pace of summer for reflection, a Duke junior ponders what students learn in their history classes these days and finds that the terrible conflict of the First World War is largely missing from the curriculum.
- The editors of the Oklahoma Daily can’t find one good thing to say about Congress’s debt deal this week, and predict that nearly everyone will suffer.
- Jersey Shore is a fun show to watch, says a reviewer for the USC Gamecock, but as “reality” TV, it has nothing at all to do with reality.
- The editor of the University of New Mexico’s Daily Lobo reviews the major issues facing his school and urges readers to get informed and involved.
- A writer for the Daily Californian acknowledges that marijuana use isn’t totally harmless, but believes that it isn’t heroin either. Why can’t the federal government see that simple fact?
