Since September, the members of the USG Academic Assembly have heard a lot of negative things. We have been called counte-productive, stupid, and as the Collegian editorial of Jan. 13 suggested, have participated in a "power trip." I'm not sure where the Board of Opinion came up with these ideas, but it certainly was not from attending our meetings.

In fact, not one member of the Board of Opinion has attended a single Academic Assembly meeting this year.

The Daily Collegian has consistently overlooked the accomplishments of the Assembly. The idea that "most of [USG's] initiatives have come through the executive branch" is both false and misleading. This year's Assembly has undertaken projects regarding first-year seminars, diversity education, SRTEs, grade inflation, the drop-add period, academic integrity, textbooks, advising, and many other important topics. All of these projects are practical in nature, and examples of what the Board of Opinions call "little things that students care about."

Many students appreciate the initiative of the Foulke administration to run busses to Lot 83. This does not, however, make the project any more valuable than the initiatives of other branches of USG. It is easy to get students excited about CATA. It is much more difficult to provoke an outpouring of emotion about advising or academic integrity. In light of all the positive work done by USG this year, it seems as though the organization missing the point of USG is not Academic Assembly, but The Daily Collegian.