From djcarter@halcyon.com Sat Dec 31 08:57:01 PST 1994 >From djcarter@halcyon.com Sat Dec 31 08:57:01 1994 Return-Path: Received: from mx4.u.washington.edu by lists.u.washington.edu (5.65+UW94.10/UW-NDC Revision: 2.32 ) id AA02942; Sat, 31 Dec 94 08:57:01 -0800 Received: from chinook.halcyon.com by mx4.u.washington.edu (5.65+UW94.10/UW-NDC Revision: 2.31 ) id AA10024; Sat, 31 Dec 94 08:56:58 -0800 Received: by halcyon.com id AA23144 (5.65c/IDA-1.4.4); Sat, 31 Dec 1994 08:56:56 -0800 Date: Sat, 31 Dec 1994 08:56:55 -0800 (PST) From: J S Carter To: Jim Augerot Cc: wpg@u.washington.edu, slavic-uw@u.washington.edu, simpson@u.washington.edu Subject: Slavics Message-Id: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII December 29, 1994 Seattle, WA 98102 Slavic Dept. Review Committee c/o John B. Simpson College of Arts and Sciences US 65 University of Washington Seattle, WA 98195 Greetings: Is it true that the university administration is planning to discontinue having a Slavic Department? This is like hearing news that a prestigious university has decided to eliminate the reason for its prestige. In my 25 years as a high school Russian Language teacher I have frequently relied on the support of this department. Perhaps most important has been their giving us a venue and judges for the annual Olympiada - a Russian language speaking contest involving students from both Washington and Oregon.. Many of the participating high school students have later become students at the University of Washington. Unfortunately statistics are not available, but I know many of the graduates of the Slavic Department have moved on into the fields of education, industry and commerce where they use the knowledge of the slavic world which they gained at the University of Washington. At this time Russia is pleading for foreign capital to form joint ventures in the construction of industrial plants and energy sources. (See: USA Today, Dec. 5, 1994.) Businessmen from many countries are responding to those pleas while America is for the most part sitting back and watching opportunities go past. At this time we need a greater awareness of and preparation for comm-ercial dealings with the former Soviet Union. By de-emphasizing slavic studies you are giving the people of Washington less of what is needed instead of more. There are many other things the University of Washington could do to get through their financial problems. If a 3% cut must be made, why not cut that amount from all departments instead of causing only a few departments to bear the full brunt? How about cutting everyone's pay - or deferring pay increases - and raising tuition? How about making retirement more attractive or in some cases, even mandatory for some of your older staff members? A university is supposed to be a concentration of the best minds which it can assmeble. Surely someone at the University of Washington can come up with a better plan than the one now being considered. Richard L. Carter Russian Language Teacher Highline High School .