Editor defends Kirwan’s actions
David Overeem claims to have done research in his Jan. 12 column on University of Maryland President William Kirwan (“Columnist does research on Kirwan”). Overeem cites The Diamondback, the independent student newspaper at the University of Maryland, as the “focus” of his research. He seemed to find the few negative stories about Kirwan in The Diamondback, yet skipped over the stories describing the amount of progress Kirwan made at the University of Maryland during his time as president.Overeem uses the example of the “massive tuition hikes” at the University of Maryland. He did not mention a $40 million budget cut to College Park during the recession of the early ’90s, nor did he mention that Maryland has finally returned to the same amount of funding it had when those cuts were made. The only problem, the university lost six years of financial growth. Simply put, Kirwan’s support of tuition increases were in the best interests if his institution.The next topic was crime in College Park. Overeem uses words such as “sea of filth” and “sewer” to describe the community Maryland resides in. Those are strong words with no facts to back them up. Again, Overeem missed an article in The Diamondback about the falling crime rates in the area. Yes, College Park is considered a safe place.Next, Overeem thrashes Maryland Gov. Parris Glendening. Except he misspelled the governor’s name. If he can’t get Glendening’s name right, how can Overeem be trusted to get hard facts correct?The topic of Kirwan’s support of affirmative action and diversity was next in Overeem’s editorial. He criticized Kirwan’s support of creating a diverse campus at the University of Maryland. If Overeem has a problem with diversity, his integrity should be questioned, not that of Ohio State’s incoming president.As for Overeem’s brother’s negative experiences at the University of Maryland, I can’t argue those. I can only say that in a large state institution, some people are going to be unhappy. I’m sure the same happens at Ohio State. Is that the president of a university’s fault? No, that’s the fault of bureaucracy.The next time Overeem claims to investigate an issue, I suggest he get all the facts before he prints what he himself admitted was “by no means complete.”
Danielle NewmanEditor in Chief, The Diamondback, University of Maryland at College Park
