From “Signing off on co-ed stalls,”

On Monday, UC President Janet Napolitano adopted measures to support lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender students, staff and faculty. We support many of the policies she presented, including allowing students to indicate a preferred name along with their legal name on official campus records. We also support the policy to convert single-stall restrooms into gender-neutral facilities and to incorporate gender-inclusive restrooms in new and renovated university buildings. But we hope each individual campus will take this one step further, living up to the spirit of the policy by having the bathroom signs also be more gender inclusive.

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[We] believe students, faculty and staff who don’t identify specifically as male or female should be able to access gender-neutral bathrooms across campus. But we believe that this measure can be taken a step further to promote an even more inclusive atmosphere on UC campuses. Currently, many bathrooms use the symbols of both a man and a woman to indicate gender inclusivity. Future signs should move past these representations and recognize that not all campus community members identify with a binary gender. A sign that eliminates posting specific genders would be more appropriate.

This may seem like a small matter to some members of the campus community, but for those who do not identify as male or female, these signs can feel exclusive. UC Berkeley has already led the way in the effort to be gender inclusive. It is time as a university to take one more step toward a positive campus environment.

The Daily Californian

University of California, Berkeley

From “It’s time to reprioritize university curriculums” by Ryan Lynch

While I respect the importance of having a cross-disciplinary understanding of different fields, I cannot help but wonder why I know how to solve for X in a polynomial equation or calculate the diameter of the moon, but can’t even properly fill out a W-4 tax form.While many universities do offer electives that teach more practical, real-world applicable skills, these classes should be part of the required core curriculum instead of optional courses.

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As humans, knowing how to save the life of someone choking should come before knowing how to solve an equation.

Understanding our rights against police officers should come before understanding a Shakespearean sonnet. While you can argue that anyone who really wants to learn this stuff can individually pursue that knowledge elsewhere, all I am saying is that including this type of information in our core curriculum would benefit us a lot more in the real-world than the current requirements.

The State Press

Arizona State University