The Barometer Online

Each year at OSU, thousands of students enter campus hoping - and expecting - to be treated as adults. The same goes for every reporter at The Daily Barometer; though we are a student newspaper we expect to be treated as any other professional publication.

How does spring break heading for the sun with grandma sound? It does not sound very enticing, I agree, but maybe because our vision of a grandma is a cane-bound old lady who is notorious for baking delicious cookies. Fortunately for me, I spent my spring break on a road trip with my grandma.

One could argue that we live in a sick world, and while the root cause of our illness is debatable, the symptoms are clear. Every day, if we listen, we hear more evidence that all is not well. Just look at a newspaper and read the headlines: "Student dies after drinking binge," "Schools struggle to avoid tuition hikes," "Boys accused of beating homeless man," "Teacher indicted on charges of sex with five students," and on and on … With all our technology, with all our progress, with all our wishes for a life where human actions do not add to the world's troubles, why do so many ills persist? Why do our choices seem to recreate endlessly the horrors of violence, of cruelty, of destruction and despair? There are many roots to the social maladies which plague us.