Letters to the Editor

1/29/09 6:00pm

Senseless parking policies irritate

To the editor:There's something about Rice that has always bugged me: parking and parking enforcement. Parking enforcement is absurd because officers have ticketed people at Martel College for parking outside the lines in our temporary lot when there aren't even lines! I know someone who got a ticket, appealed it, but was refused because she had received a ticket in the past (not even for a similar offense!). Finally, after construction closed off Alumni Drive by Wiess College, brand new parking gate openers were put in at the intersection of the Inner Loop and Entrance 4. Yes, those gates that they never used before (besides at Night of Decadence) and will probably never use again. Imagine how much they cost. Who paid for them? Parking (which hardly needs a reason to charge students more) or the construction project?

Mike Benza

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Martel College senior

Religious studies great department

To the editor:

Thanks for highlighting Jewish studies at Rice in your article and editorial last week ("Jewish studies minor holds promise for future programs," Jan. 23). I agree that it's a huge step forward for Rice as an academic institution. However, calling the Jewish studies program the "lone religious studies program offered by the university" is misleading on two levels.

First, the Religious Studies Department at Rice is small but formidable in its accomplishments and prestige. In 2007, the department ranked fifth in The Chronicle of Higher Education's Faculty Scholarly Productivity Index, right among universities with large divinity schools and religious studies departments that are five times its size.

Second, the academic study of Judaism is not just the study of a religion, it is a multidisciplinary field that requires seeing through the lenses of history, sociology, religious studies, political science, philosophy and linguistics. This is one of the reasons why so many non-Jewish students are interested in a Jewish studies program at Rice: It allows students to explore a particular tradition through a variety of disciplines.

The creation of the Jewish studies program is wonderful, and will only increase our prestige in the future, yet I believe that Rice has a religious studies department worth being proud of right now.

Lauren Henderson

Will Rice College senior

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