University of Virginia Library

The Work Ethic

Tonight at Webb Lounge from 7 to 9,
Student Council will sponsor an informal
opportunity for students to meet and talk
with the candidates for the Student Council
and Judiciary Committee. This may not
sound like anyone's idea of a rousing time–
to stand around on one foot and the other,
sipping punch and nibbling on cookies with a
bevy of smiling politicos. But Student
Council, having accomplished some things in
the past and having the potential to do much
more in the future, ought to be taken
seriously.

Most all the candidates run on nearly the
same platforms: to "establish
communications," to "increase black student
enrollment," to "lobby against further
enrollment increases and maintain a high
out-of-state student ratio," to "get better
food from Food Services," and to "work for
more and better off-Grounds housing." These
issues have been circulating about forever,
often but only slightly amended.

Student Council has, in the past, been
called a useless organization of power-hungry,
egotistical, self-important flunkies who could
really care less about student interests and
problems and who grab up these positions to
compensate for their failures academically. If
this was ever the case, it is no longer, and the
majority of the candidates presently up for
consideration are, in our opinion, extremely
serious ones who genuinely have the interests
of the students in mind.

What, then, should one look for in a
candidate? To generalize a bit, Council's years
of "ineffectiveness" have been due
primarily to the members' aversion to work.
While Council may have failed to place a
student on the Board of Visitors, or to
expand the number of liberal arts seminars
and broaden the curriculum, these failures
stem from an overall deficiency in
commitment to the task at hand. Everyone is
"concerned," but who behind the
smokescreen will serve as a real spark to finish
the simple tasks which were begun so long
ago?

Every organization seeks people with
ideas, with proposals for constructive reform
and plans for action. Without these things no
organization could realistically maintain any
hope of survival. Council has the ideas, as it
always has. What it now needs is people to
actualize those ideas. Especially in these times
of mounting student apathy, in which
demonstrators and their now tiny bands of
followers are scoffed at and ridiculed, there is
an urgent necessity, as seldom before, to
work within the system, if anything at all is to
be accomplished.

What we desire is for people to attend the
gathering this evening, to ask the incumbents
about their past records and those newcomers
about their devotion. Try to wipe the "used
car salesman" smirks off their faces and pry a
little into their deep-seated loyalties and real
abilities. No one is so deceptive as to fool
everyone all of the time. Above all, inquire
about each candidate's affinity for work.

The problem with Student Council as it
now stands is that every time we visit the
offices we see the same four or five people
diligently at work. These are the people to
re-elect, or to elevate to higher positions. But,
in any case, give them help, not only your
votes and your moral support, but also
co-workers who emulate them in their
commitment to a certain work ethic.