Letters to the
E ditor UW system needs equality:
Dear editor, I am responding to the editorial that was published in the June 28, 2023 edition of the Tribune-Phonograph.
The enrollment of the University of Wisconsin system is approximately 125,000 full-time-equivalent students. The expenditure of $32 million for Diversity, Inclusion, and Equity (DIE) staff averages over $250 per student. If given a choice, how many UW students, who are waiting tables, sweeping floors, or bagging groceries to pay for tuition, would write a $250 check to the university for this service? How many former students, who are struggling to repay their high-interest government education loans, would feel that they received great value for the more than $1,000 they borrowed to pay those 188 DIE staffers?
The UW students are not given an opportunity to make these economic decisions. They are forced to rely upon the judgment of UW administrators, whose economic judgment has been suspect in many matters. Now, the Wisconsin state legislature has stepped in, once again, to protect the economic interests of the students (and taxpayers).
Wisconsin state government has made some efforts in recent years to manage the budget by fighting to eliminate unnecessary spending like this. Unlike fiscally irresponsible states, and unlike the US federal government, they have built a budget surplus. One of many reasons for their relative fiscal success is that they are sometimes willing to resist bloating of the bureaucracy, and to cut unproductive jobs, even when there is no budget crisis. Actions such as this reinforce the desirable stereotype of fiscal responsibility and common sense of Wisconsin state government.
The results of money spent to promote diversity, inclusion, and equity are controversial, at best. For every person who benefits from these policies, at least one other person is harmed. From the point of view of people who have been harmed by DIE policies, this acronym appears to stand for discrimination, indoctrination, and exclusion. Now that the United States Supreme Court has finally decided that Affirmative Action is unconstitutional, there is no justification for spending money on DIE staff.
Your sympathy for the 188 DIE staffers who will lose their jobs is commendable. I have similar sympathy for the 12,000 private sector construction workers (many from Wisconsin), who lost their jobs when the President of the United States forced the construction of the Keystone Pipeline to be halted. The displaced construction workers were advised to seek training for coding jobs. Perhaps, this would be good advice for these DIE staffers, too.
The UW should strive to teach equal opportunity by enacting and enforcing policies that welcome all people under the same rules. This can be done without hiring bureaucrats who specialize in implementing equality. It should be part of the job of every teacher, administrator, and staff person, beginning with the UW System president. Perhaps it would please the bureaucrats to assign an appropriate Wisconsin acronym to this policy - Educational Impartiality and Equal Individual Opportunity (EIEIO).
Students in the UW-System will go on to be business leaders, entrepreneurs, physicians, engineers, scientists, law enforcement professionals, teachers, lawyers, social workers, politicians, and even journalists. They, and those of us who depend on their skills, should be confident that they earned their degrees only due to their outstanding talent, effort, and ethics.
Bruce Bohr Marathon
Reflections on my Dad on Father’s Day:
I grew up living in the funeral home in Marathon City. My parents, Lawrence G and Elsie Lohr, had purchased the funeral home and furniture store in 1944. Dad had been working at a funeral home in Madison, WI when he heard that Frank Stieber had his business for sale. I was not quite one year old when we moved to Marathon City.
The funeral chapel was on the first floor of a large two-story brick house. My bedroom was directly above the funeral chapel. Living in such proximity, my sisters, Jackie, Linda, and I, grew up observing the funeral business. One of my observations was how dad behaved with the same reverence and respect for the families of the deceased. It didn’t matter how rich, well connected, religious affiliation, gender, or sexual orientation of the person or family. Pastors, priests, and rabbis also spoke of the positive aspects of the life that had passed. Mourners passed through saying how good the person had been. Marathon City was a small town, so, in some cases, I knew better. It is strange that today, some pastors, priests, rabbis, and media personalities condemn whole groups of people as evil. In a small town setting it is difficult to hate individuals that you know. It is however, easier to condemn outsiders we are not in close contact with.
In the furniture business dad taught me that if one sold good quality furniture, at a fair price, and gave good service, one would always have business. He also taught me that one did not qualify things, or people, as capital. Things and people are to be valued for the qualities they had, not for the money one could make from them. When my parents built Pine Valley Golf Course, it was with the idea of having a course, that would be well built and maintained, but also be affordable for the average income person. He worked with my mother as a true partner in business and supported the academic efforts of my two brilliant sisters. He taught me fairness in dealing with all types of people was expected of a good man. Empathy for others, especially those less fortunate was important.
I was taught to see the best in people we met, and not to make negative judgment based on stereotypes. I watched many Western and B gangster films at the Marathon theater, which was upstairs in the village hall across the street from our house. Those films created heroes out of hard physical men who did not shy from using violence. I saw my father as a different male role model. While he was physically very strong, and did hard physical work, that was not what defined him. He was thoughtful, valued education, and was liked by almost everyone who met him. He taught me to use my talents, effort, and will, to make the most of the time I have in life. He also believed that wealth brought responsibility. I was taught to believe the Biblical story of Lazarus, the beggar, eating the scraps of the master’s table being raised to Abraham’s bosom after death, while his miserly master went to hades. Wealth and status do not make us better than those who have not been as successful.
When I think of my parents, I think of the differences in the Old and New Testaments of the Bible. People today often say they would like to see the Ten Commandments engraved on court house walls. They like the “Thou shalt” statements and the tribalism of the Old Testament. The Old Testament teachings make us feel powerful. The New Testament is written about the teachings of Jesus. Rarely do people say they would like the statements of Jesus from the beatitudes, engraved on the court house walls… “Blessed are the merciful, the meek, those who mourn, those who are persecuted, the pure in heart, the peacemakers, the poor (Luke), the poor in spirit (Matthew)…”, or His teaching us to…”Love our neighbors as ourselves”. My parents were New Testament type people, and, as a man, dad exemplified those virtues for me.
Rick Lohr Marathon
