North Carolina State University - Agromeck Yearbook (Raleigh, NC)

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Ill the first place there is evidence from across the Nation that some types of campuses experience more overt student discontent than others. Greatest inci- dence accords with the campus having a highly selective student body who are studying predomin- antly in the humanities and social sciences and who are upper middle class in income and background. (That generalization obviously applies to the pre- dominantly white institutions.) The lowest incidence of discontent and protest occurs on the small, work-oriented, relatively open-admissions campuses. No two campuses have an identical profile. NCSU is predominantly career-oriented scientific and techno- logical. 1967-68 enrollment in liberal arts courses, it is true, accounted for 36. 7 per cent of total credit hours taught at the University. But despite this fact the flavor of the campus is heavily career-oriented, admissions selectivity is modestly high, student economic background ranges from low to upper middle class affluency, and indeed solid middle class would be a fair description. Tliese are probably the basic reasons NCSU has thus far escaped notable student militancy. ChanceUor John T. Caldwell, 1968

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0 ' JK:, iT .-f%- T- Ultimately what difference can my violent denunciation of the war in Vietnam make? So what if I believe in some high-minded principle like the dignity of Man? Does it matter how I feel? What ' s going on? Am I supposed to find some answers? Are my questions relevant? And so goes the circular reasoning of despair. My mind wandered in class-when I attended. I was bad company; my roommate despised me. So I often sought solitude, partly to think, most- ly to get away from others.

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At State it ' s not so easy to be alone. Wherever you walk, there are people engaged in the same inane pursuits that I wanted to escape. And where there aren ' t people, there are other reminders: classrooms, tennis courts- there ' s really no place to forget the world. The best plan, I found, was to walk and think at night— late. The campus is eerie then— only bathroom lights and a few campus cops to keep you company. Certain parts of the campus are espe- cially dark and quiet: the field behind Lee, the railroad tracks. Riddick Stadium, before they tore it down, were my favorites. After several months of these walks, my problem began to explain itself. What I do in the present is influenced by the past and the future. If I don ' t understand what happens now, chances are it ' s because I don ' t under- stand my history. Frustration with questions about myself then does not necessarily imply inabiUty to answer them. It simply means my current desires are conflicting with my past which hasn ' t adequately prepared me for serious thought. Perhaps, but what of the future? Can I really plan for it, or will the present always be shaped by the past? For awhile that was the most demanding question. Then I decided the future is far less important than the past or present for we have direct knowledge of the last two-a good job, in light of yesterday, and tomorrow usually takes care of itself.