After some student leaders objected to remarks made in November by University Board of Trustees member Ben Novak, the board heard Friday a report on how student organizations enhance education.

"I am very delighted that the subject of the other half of a college education are being brought to the attention of the board," Novak said.

At the last meeting of the board, Graduate Student Association President Ken Martin and Undergraduate Student Government President Janyne Althaus protested remarks made by Novak. The student leaders said Novak unfairly implied today's students are not as involved when compared to students of the past.

"I wish they would object to the trustees more," Novak said. "I thought it was wonderful."

In Friday's report, Vice President for Student Services William Asbury, three students and a faculty member supported the idea that extracurricular activities can supplement academics.

Asbury told trustees that a growing number of organizations can sometimes put a strain on student services, but stressed that programs are available to help students with difficulties.

Chuck Strauss, associate professor of forest economics and adviser to several student organizations, said faculty can play a part in student development outside the classroom. As an adviser, it is possible to give students the "voice of experience," he said.

Student groups are valuable because they teach responsibility and can help the University to teach students a sense of aesthetics and of difference, Asbury said.

Interfraternity Council President Tom Lynch agreed. The experience of handling budgets and working together to accomplish a job teaches young people involvement, he said.

"No one learns when they have responsibility taken away from them," he said.

Linda Rothermel, coordinator of Lion's Share and president of the Penn State Marketing Association, added that many activities give students a sense of how they can help others.

"It's a good time in your life to see what you can give back to the community," she said.

Jeff Ballou, who said he represented no specific organization, but rather "the experience of being involved" said it is often through the work and involvement of students that society is changed.

Movements to end the Vietnam War and to promote civil and women's rights would have been crippled without student activism, he said. Ballou has been active in a number of organizations on campus including WPSU, the Student Minority Advisory and Recruitment Team, Black Caucus, Lion Ambassadors and the Equal Opportunity Planning Committee, on which he is the undergraduate student representative.

Novak said the presentation was a good first step to bringing students' out-of-the-classroom activity to the board's attention.

"There are many concepts that need to be examined," he said.