Miller: The right choice

As unfortunate as it is, IU is a business and the effect is similar to the dilemma of American health care – it’s a public good forced to eke out a profit everywhere possible. Often, education here is considered secondary to roping money from alumni and attracting research grants. The life of the mind, as it were, defers to the nearest donation or athletics construction.\nTrustee candidate Steven Miller is pragmatic about the challenges of a university, of the needed balance between attractive funding opportunities like the life science initiative and the societal need for liberal arts education. As a public university, he noted in his response to the editorial board, IU has a duty to educate the population, but lacking the considerable endowment of a private liberal arts college, the school must shift to research to garner funds. He realizes there are significant problems that need to be addressed: the faculty here is largely underpaid, for instance; and it’s a step beyond insanity to rebuild a stadium that’s only packed with cream and crimson when Wisconsin plays. And it’s not as if living in a 12-by-12 dorm room built in the 1960s with a complete stranger builds character.\nDue to his background in finance and business, and as longtime member of the IU community, he seems to understand the lunacy of leaving University policy to scholars and retirees who pander for money across the state – money that seems to be funneled in almost criminal amounts to athletics, which is frankly a comment on the delusions of the current trustees.