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(04/17/08 4:00am)
Editor's note:This is part three in a three-part series about the IU Foundation’s investments in companies linked to the genocide in Darfur.\nProfessor Steve Weitzman and departing IU Foundation President Curt Simic could not have taken more different roads to get where they are today. For the past seven months, they have headed opposite sides of a debate about investing in companies linked to funding the genocide in Darfur.\nSteve Weitzman never considered himself an activist. He graduated from University of California, Berkeley, but was never seriously involved with politics. The same can be said for his time as a grad student at Harvard.\nYet Weitzman, an IU Religious Studies professor, saw a connection between the Holocaust and genocide in Darfur and has become a central figure in the debate surrounding IU investment policy. He is pushing the University to adopt a policy of what he calls socially responsible investing, which would require IU’s investment managers to monitor funds and ensure that no money is tied to Darfur.\nCurt Simic, a native Hoosier and 1964 IU graduate, has served IU for 20 years, raising money from donations to fund research, scholarships and academic programs at IU.\nJust 74 days remain until his retirement. Already, his tenure is being celebrated. Late Indiana Governor Frank O’Bannon labeled him as a “distinguished Hoosier,” while others at the University praised him the savior of University fundraising.\nWeitzman contends that IU has a duty to take financial action against the companies invested in the Sudanese government. Simic, on the other hand, says his main loyalty is to IU donors who entrust him with their gifts.\nA legacy to pass\nAs Weitzman read The New York Times about a year ago, a story caught his eye. That story linked Fidelity, one of the companies that provides IU’s retirements plans, to the genocide in Darfur.\nWith his own retirement plan invested through Fidelity, he felt partly responsible for the genocide.\nWeitzman said he has no choice but to take action now. He said one of the lessons of the Holocaust is that those who turn a blind eye are equally to blame as those who commit the violence.\n“By not doing anything, it’s also making a decision,” Weitzman said. “If you don’t respond to this situation, you’re also setting a precedent.”\nThis precedent, he said, could allow humans to carry out genocide in the future. Weitzman moved his retirement funds from Fidelity to TIAA-CREF, the other financial services company available to IU faculty and administrators for retirement investing. TIAA-CREF maintains the Social Choice Account, which targets investments that meet certain social criteria. The returns on that fund are not as high as the ones he received from Fidelity, he said, and with a wife and four young boys at home, money is not something he wants to take lightly.\n“I’ll lose some money over the course of the years,” he said. “But at the end of the day, what am I going to pass on to my kids? I don’t want to pass on to them a world that turns the other way when a genocide is committed.”\nWhile much of the recent divestment discussion has centered around investments by the IU Foundation – the University’s chartered nonprofit corporation – Weitzman and others around the country have also questioned IU’s agreements with Fidelity.\nThe University applauded Fidelity recently for apparently ending much of its indirect ties to Darfur, but some activists still charge that Fidelity remains invested through overseas markets.\nFidelity and TIAA-CREF are the only financial services companies currently available to IU faculty. Faculty members can choose between the companies and invest retirement money in one or both.\nThey also have the freedom to decide the types of funds. Because each of the companies offers many types of investment options, faculty and administrators have the freedom to personalize their portfolios. For example, TIAA-CREF’s Social Choice Account is just one of many options faculty and administrators can choose from. \nWeitzman said the University, as well as faculty, are part of an academic institution that is obligated to maintain a moral conscience.\n“This is not a corporation, and we are not just employees,” he said.\nMutual respect\nWeitzman’s office is small. Worn wooden chairs crowd around a small table cluttered with books, papers and manila folders. Bookshelves are full, and volumes of religious texts cover the room, leaning haphazardly on shelves or sitting in small piles on the floor. An air-conditioning unit obscures part of the only window.\nThree miles away, Showalter House, the headquarters of the IU Foundation, is distinctively corporate. Gray stone walls reach to the freshly polished, wood-paneled ceiling. Sunlight floods through large windows, welcoming visitors and potential donors. Showalter House has doubled in size during the past 30 years to accommodate the skyrocketing level of endowment. \nThrough a winding hallway, behind security-sealed doors, Simic’s office is a symbol of his power at IU. Two winged chairs and a burgundy leather couch welcome visitors into the large office. A grandfather clock rests against one wall and a large, ornate wooden desk fills the center of the room. It’s here that Simic controls huge sums of University dollars. It’s here that Simic transformed the IU Foundation into a mammoth institutional force during the past three decades.\nPart of the time, Simic collects donations from some of IU’s wealthiest alumni. At other times, he consoles students in crisis.\nThe girl’s father was dead – suicide, she told Simic, sitting on the couch inside his office just a few weeks ago. She could no longer afford tuition, and wondered aloud whether Simic could help.\n“I told her we were going to figure something out,” Simic said. He said he spends part of every day helping others.\nSolving these problems at the institution he has loved for decades is Simic’s idea of social responsibility.\nWith about 10 weeks until his retirement, the debate about divestment could be one of Simic’s last.\nNone of this is personal. Both Weitzman and Simic express respect for one another.\nWeitzman’s a “good man,” Simic said, a passionate man. Despite this, Simic said Weitzman’s logic is fundamentally flawed.\nThe $6 million in Foundation investments that have been linked to the genocide is less than 1 percent of the Foundation’s total endowment, and Simic said divestment would have minimal impact on the Foundation. However, he does not want to set a precedent that might allow activists to sway the Foundation in the future. He also said divesting $6 million would never make a real difference in the genocide. He said IU’s proposed divestment would be a “symbolic” gesture, something he wants to avoid. \n“I don’t want to act merely symbolically, either,” Weitzman said.\nWeitzman said when it comes to genocide, all gestures matter. He likens divesting IU’s $6 million to voting: A single vote might seem insignificant. But “voting is not symbolic,” and neither is divestment, he said.\nSimic, sitting in his office with Vice President for Investments Gary Stratten, reiterated that he thinks he has time to take some sort of practical action on Sudan. Many wait for those efforts; he has 74 days left to make up his mind.\nSolving problems is simply a part of their jobs, Stratten and Simic will agree. A few more discussions likely await Simic in what’s been years of triumph and challenge. Stratten smiled at the long-time leader. Ten weeks until he steps aside.\n“But who’s counting?”
(04/16/08 4:00am)
Editor's note: This article is part 1 of a 3-part series on divestment. Parts 2 and 3 will appear in the IDS Wednesday and Thursday.
(03/06/08 8:05am)
Many universities, including IU, have programs that offer inmates in correctional facilities the opportunity to get a college degree. IU, however, only offers inmates distance learning courses, which are taught through mail correspondence.\nIncarcerated students taking classes through IU might have a more difficult time than those taking classes through universities that provide on-site instruction for inmates because there is no face-to-face interaction between teachers and students. Also, students taking classes through the IU program must fund their own education because only students who take on-site courses full-time are eligible for state grants, said Roy Durnal, the senior associate director of financial aid at IU. \nAt IU, Indiana residents taking distance courses pay $145.06 per credit hour, and non-Indiana residents pay $164.22 per credit hour, said Lisa Denlinger, executive director of marketing and communication for IU’s School of Continuing Studies.\nPurdue University, Ball State University and Indiana State University, among others, provide on-site instruction for inmates at various correctional facilities around the state, according to information from the Indiana Department of Correction. Those students would be eligible for state grants, but most incarcerated students taking correspondence courses from IU must rely on their families to pay for classes, said John Nally, the director of education for the Department of Correction.\nJoanna Wallace, associate dean for the School of Extended Education at Ball State University, through which Ball State conducts its correctional education program, said most incarcerated students taking classes through the program are full-time students who receive financial assistance from state grants. Wallace said the university has a little more than 100 faculty members who teach in the correctional facilities, most full-time. Having teachers on-site allows for more control of exactly how courses are taught, she said. It also allows for more consistency between the classes on the Ball State campus and those in the state correctional facility in Michigan City, Ind., and five correctional facilities where Ball State has programs for incarcerated students.\nDaniel Callison, dean of IU’s School of Continuing Studies, said he has not ruled out the possibility of having talks about incorporating elements of on-site instruction into IU’s education programs at correctional facilities.\n“Our school should consider in its future activities and future plans ways in which we can cooperate more and work more with Purdue, Ball State and other academic institutions to undergird and work with that kind of face-to-face delivery,” Callison said.\nHe said IU could “probably provide elements of online delivery” that could be used with other schools’ on-site programs.\nBut Nally said he’s still happy with the role IU is playing in the education system in the Department of Correction. IU’s correspondence program makes it easy for inmates to take a few classes required for a degree, he said. \nHe also said IU’s School of Continuing Studies has been receptive to transfer credits, making it easier for inmates to continue to work toward a degree without losing credit hours if the inmate transfers from an on-site program to IU’s program.\nRichard White, a 46-year-old inmate, is almost finished with his IU bachelor’s degree. Almost as soon as White completes his degree – he has five courses left – and receives the two-year time cut off his sentence that accompanies it, he will be free to leave the facility. Because mail must be checked on the way in and out of the facility, the process is slow, and he uses the extra time to think about life after incarceration. He said that when he goes home, he wants to become a counselor for troubled youth, because he knows from personal experience what they’re going through. He said he blamed himself for a lot of problems he saw in his family growing up and doesn’t want other kids to feel the same way. \nHis mother, Norma Doyle, said she would like to see him help kids, as well. She sometimes brings her granddaughter to see him at the Westville Correctional Facility, and she said they get along well.\n“I take my granddaughter up there all the time, and he’ll tell her, ‘Marissa, anything that happens with your mother or your father – never think that it’s your fault because it’s not,’” Doyle said. (Because she’s a juvenile, Marissa’s name has been changed to protect her identity.) “I mean, he is just so good with kids, and I believe counseling would be a good thing for him.”\nDoyle said White isn’t the only one anticipating his homecoming – Marissa is too.\n“She loves him,” Doyle said. “She’ll just sit, and they read together, or if she gets nervous she bites her nails, and he tells her about all the germs underneath her fingernails. He just keeps her occupied and keeps talking to her, and telling her, ‘When Uncle Dickie gets home, it’s going to be a lot better for you, and if you ever need to talk about anything, you can always talk to Uncle Dickie.’”\nDonna Cummins is the institutional teacher at Westville, and part of her duty includes coordinating the IU correspondence program at the facility. She said White was helpful when she began her job at the facility, making a chart for her that shows how many credits students need to complete various degrees, to which she still frequently refers.\n“He’s really come a long way,” Cummins said about White. “I could be wrong, but I don’t think that he’ll be back.”\nBut for now, White continues to wait for his lessons. In doing so, he is also waiting for the day when he will walk through the gates into the parking lot. He will climb into a car. And then, as an ex-inmate – but also as a college graduate – he will finally go home.
(03/06/08 1:12am)
Donald Gray teaches inmates through IU’s School of Continuing Studies, and he said that, for the most part, inmates turn in work indistinguishable from the rest of students taking distance learning courses. \nSometimes, Gray said, it’s only a postal address that tips him off to the fact a student is incarcerated because he never sees his distance learning students. But every once in a while, an inmate turns in an assignment that reminds Gray what education can mean to those without easy access to campus. And this education often benefits both the students and the public, experts say. \nGray said an exam from one student was particularly telling.\n“One of the questions on an examination was ‘If you were going to set up a course using some of the books you had read, which would you read and why?’” Gray said. “He went through every book that he had read in the course, and he pulled out from each of the books a lesson that he said if he had learned, he would not be in the trouble that he got into. And I wrote back. I said, ‘This is the most interesting examination I’ve ever read.’ And then I got a letter from his mother. His mother said he had called her up, and he was in tears. No teacher had ever said anything that encouraging before.”\nGray said he thinks that kind of message is part of the reason he keeps teaching and why public universities such as IU have an obligation to serve the broadest student body possible.\n“The satisfaction is hearing people who would not get this learning unless it was offered in a different way,” he said. “And that’s certainly true of people who are in prison.”\nExperts say offering education programs in correction facilities reduces the chances of inmates returning to a life of crime, helps them get jobs and saves taxpayers money.\nJohn Nally, the director of education for the Indiana Department of Correction, said the planning division of the Department of Correction tracks recidivism, or the percentage of released inmates re-offending and returning to the Indiana Department of Correction. Statistically, Nally said, inmates who receive some sort of education while incarcerated are less likely to return to the Indiana Department of Correction. According to data from the planning division of the Indiana Department of Correction, which conducted its most recent study on recidivism, or the likelihood an offender will reoffend, in 2002, 39.3 percent of all offenders released that year recidivated. However, of inmates who received a time cut for completing a bachelor’s degree, only 18 percent recidivated.\nTo encourage students to take advantage of the available educational opportunities, inmates who complete a GED while incarcerated receive a half-year time cut off their sentences, those who complete an associate’s degree receive a year time cut and those who complete a bachelor’s degree receive a two-year time cut. \nIndiana inmates who take classes might benefit from the time cuts more than inmates in other states. Nally said that while many states have similar laws regarding time cuts, Indiana is unusual in the way time cuts are applied. Inmates serve half their original sentence if they meet behavioral standards while incarcerated, and most do. For example, if a judge sentences an inmate to 20 years, the inamte generally serves 10. After this initial time-reduction is made, the Indiana Department of Correction applies any educational time cuts earned to the shortened sentence. So an inmate sentenced in Indiana who completes a bachelor’s degree while serving a 20-year sentence might actually serve eight years. Other states apply time cuts to an inmate’s original, unreduced sentence and then reduce that number by half, which means inmates would serve more time.\nEducation programs also make sense economically, Nally said, because keeping an individual incarcerated costs about $56 a day, and such programs might be a way to keep offenders out of correctional facilities and prisons.\n“You’re taking people who are using tax dollars, and you’re converting them to people who are paying tax dollars,” he said. “Criminal policy is economic policy.”\nSusan Lockwood, who is responsible for the education of the Indiana Department of Correction’s adjudicated juveniles, agreed. She said it is important that offenders receive some sort of training while incarcerated because having job skills gives released inmates a chance to do something other than return to a life of crime. She said one of the most important factors of successful societal re-entry for inmates is getting a job. And, she said, “The only way you get it is if you’re educated.”
(03/04/08 8:51pm)
“This is an awful lot like a college campus,” says John Schrader, motioning to several groups of buildings and walkways that sprawl out in front of him. \nTo a college student’s eye, the arrangement of buildings might indeed suggest something similar to the layout of a quad, with large, rectangular buildings set back from the small roads that lead to them. The buildings are arranged together in clusters, each small cluster separated from the others. And in some sense, the landscape is kind of like a college campus.\nBut behind Schrader is a fence covered in razor wire and charged with an electrical current strong enough to knock a grown man to the ground. \nIn front of him is the Westville Correctional Facility in Westville, Ind., which houses more than 3,000 inmates. Inside the walls of the buildings – the ones with doors that lock from the outside, the ones closely watched by trained guards – are some of IU’s most unlikely students. A number of inmates are pursuing associate’s and bachelor’s degrees, hoping to one day walk out from behind those walls, through the facility gates and into the outside world with a college education. \nIU’s incarcerated students complete lessons and correspond with professors via regular mail, because they do not have access to the Internet. The process can be time-consuming for the inmates, who eagerly await the mail each day to see if they’ll be one step closer to their degree and the shortened sentences that accompany it.\nSchrader, the public information officer for Westville, walks into his office and shakes hands with Richard White, an inmate pursuing a degree in general studies from IU. The general studies degree is the only degree available to students who take classes through IU’s correspondence program. \nWhite has a full beard and long hair braided into a ponytail. His muscular forearms are covered with tattoos, some of which he said he did himself while in prison. He is 46 years old and said he has been in and out of correctional facilities, mostly for burglary and drug convictions, since he was 15 or 16. Every time he was released, he returned to the same lifestyle. He said he thinks getting a college degree could finally help him break that cycle.\nSince 2000, IU has served almost 700 incarcerated students like White, said Lisa Denlinger, the executive director of marketing and communication for IU’s School of Continuing Studies. Daniel Callison, the dean of the school, said the School of Continuing Studies began serving inmates in the 1970s, but record-keeping from that time makes it difficult to discern just how many inmates have taken courses through IU or exactly when the program began. IU’s program is different from those of other universities in the state, Callison said, because IU only offers inmates correspondence courses, which means inmates have no direct teacher-student interaction. Generally, Callison said the courses consist of about 12 lessons and at least two proctored exams. For inmates in Indiana, staff members at the various correctional facilities and the state prison in Michigan City, Ind., oversee the process of distributing textbooks and lessons, making sure mail arrives on time and proctoring students’ exams.\nLike many students on the IU campus in Bloomington, White wants nothing more than to graduate. Unlike students in Bloomington, however, he has an added incentive: If he receives his bachelor’s degree while behind bars, he can receive a two-year time cut off his sentence. \nSo on this day, like many before it, White waits for the mail, hoping to receive lessons for one of his classes or grades from a class he has already completed so he can move on to his next one. The facility’s mail system is slow. Mail must be checked on the way into and out of the facility, to ensure it contains no illegal drugs or other banned materials. That, added on to IU’s sometimes lengthy processing of lessons and tests, means White spends many days frustrated. \nFor White, any day behind bars is one day too many. Set to be released in 2012, White has already received time cuts of one year for receiving his associate’s degree. During his trial, White said the judge ordered the last two years of his sentence be completed under house arrest – meaning he could go home in 2010. Add the potential two-year time-cut from his nearly-completed bachelor’s degree, and White could be out of the facility this year. White said he has only five classes remaining, and he’d like to finish them as quickly as possible. But he can only work as fast as the mail system will allow. So he waits.
(01/16/08 7:51am)
With the presidential primaries commanding much of the media’s attention, November’s concurrent congressional elections might not yet seem pressing to voters.\nBut for Republican Mike Sodrel, the race is already underway. Sodrel will challenge Democratic incumbent Baron Hill to represent Indiana’s 9th District in the U.S. House \nof Representatives. \nSodrel spoke to about 30 members of the IU College Republicans on Monday night in the Sassafras Room of the Indiana Memorial Union in what he said was an effort to recruit volunteers for his campaign. \nSodrel focused his lecture on what he believes will be some of the defining issues of the race, including taxes, health care, immigration, job creation and social security.\nIU College Republicans chairwoman Chelsea Kane said Sodrel’s campaign contacted her in late December about the possibility of hosting an event. She said she thinks it’s important for young voters to get to know more about their representatives, especially in such an intimate environment. \n“It’s important, whether you’re a Democrat or a Republican, to find out what these (congressmen) are about and see who is going to best represent you,” she said. “This is a format where you can talk one-on-one with your potential representative.” \nCassie Alderson, the press secretary for the IU College Republicans, agreed. She said the race for the 9th District, which includes Bloomington and most of southeastern Indiana, is important because it is historically competitive, which could encourage its representative to be more responsive to the needs of constituents. \n“I think things will actually get done (in Congress) because (the 9th District) is competitive,” she said. \nThe upcoming election will be Sodrel’s fourth bid for a House seat, and he has faced Hill in each of his previous races.\nRyan Reger, Sodrel’s campaign manager, said Congressional candidates cannot officially file to run until Jan. 23, but it is likely Sodrel and Hill will square off for a fourth time in November. After losing to Hill in 2002, Sodrel was elected in 2004 and served out his two-year term before losing again in 2006. \nBut Sodrel cautioned members of the group not to characterize the race as a grudge match. \n“(This race) has nothing to do with me or my opponent,” he said. “What it has to do with is what you think the future of the United States is, and where you think the country is going. I would be on the ballot irrespective of who happened to be on the other side.” \nSodrel said he hopes voters will make their decisions based on the issues on which he and Hill differ, instead of personality or history.\nDeputy campaign manager Diego Morales said IU students and Bloomington residents can expect to see more of Sodrel, partly because frequent trips to Monroe County proved successful in 2006, and the campaign sees the county as an important one in 2008. \n“Before he was elected to Congress (in 2004), he came a number of times (to) Bloomington,” Morales said. “You’re going to see him many, many times.”
(01/09/08 6:05am)
Freshman Brooke Smith said she already enjoys trips to the IU Art Museum, having last visited several months ago. But sitting at Starbucks at the IMU sipping a Strawberries & Cream Frappuccino, she said she might be even more likely to visit again if the museum offered attractions other than visual art alone.\nWhen the museum hosts a series of three “coffeehouse nights” in January, it will do just that.\nThe museum will be open to students and the public for three consecutive Thursdays, Jan. 10, 17 and 24, between 7 and 9 p.m., with each night focusing on one area of the museum’s collections, said Emily Powell, the museum’s manager of external relations. Powell also said every week will have a different theme with art and coffee from either Africa, Italy or India.\nEach night will also showcase different musical performances to serve as background music for the events. As with the choice of coffees, the art museum sought out performers whose sound would reflect the featured culture of the evening. On Jan. 10, musicians will perform on the mbira, a traditional instrument of Africa. An Italian vocalist will perform on Jan. 17, and a guitarist will perform on Jan. 24, according to an IU Art Museum press release.\nGuests at the event will also be eligible for raffle prizes, Powell said. Each evening will feature what she described as “scavenger hunts,” where visitors will be handed flyers with questions that can be answered by looking carefully at the art on display. Completed flyers can be turned in and will be entered into a drawing, and winners will receive items from the Angles Café and Gift Shop at the museum. In the past, Powell said winners have received gifts like coffee mugs and academic calendars, among other items, though she said prizes change with each drawing.\nThis will be the third series of its kind, Powell said. She said the previous two were been held in Septembers past, and that about 200 students showed up for each night. With that kind of turnout, Powell said the museum was looking for another way to attract students and the general public to its permanent exhibits and decided to try a coffeehouse nights series in January.\nNanette Brewer, a curator with the museum who is in charge of works on paper, helped choose some of the art to be featured on Jan. 17. \n“What we’re trying to do is highlight some pieces (of art),” she said, “just to give them a little freshness, draw people’s attention to them and make it a fun event.”\nJoanne Davis, the museum’s events coordinator, said the events take months to plan. She said the museum orders coffee well in advance of the evenings and has partnered with Bloomingfoods to provide complimentary cookies and sweets for the nights. Those things, combined with choosing art to display, booking musicians to perform and other tasks, make the coffeehouse nights different for each visit to the museum. \n“There’s definitely a nice deal of work that goes into it,” she said.\nStudents will be able to enjoy that work soon.\n“Coffee, candy, plus art,” said junior Mike Bowman, sitting next to Smith at Starbucks. “How can you go wrong?”
(11/14/07 6:23am)
NEW ALBANY, Ind. – President Bush announced that he signed a defense spending bill Tuesday morning, ensuring U.S. troops have “the full support of the federal government,” during a speech he gave at The Grand Convention Center in New Albany, Ind. During the same speech, he said he also vetoed another bill aimed at funding labor, health, human services and education because it was nearly $10 billion over budget. \n“If (Congress) insist(s) on trying to raise taxes on the American people, I will not hesitate to use my veto pen to stop them,” he said.\nThe speech was hosted by One Southern Indiana, the combined Chamber of Commerce and economic development organization for Clark and Floyd counties.\nIn his speech, Bush said he is focused on reducing government spending, cutting taxes and supporting the U.S. military. ThePresident repeatedly chastised Congress for attempting to raise taxes to support what he said is unnecessary spending.\nThe President also accused Congress of attempting to create government solutions to financial situations he said he believes would be better left in the hands of citizens.\n“My philosophy is that the American people know how to spend their money better than the government can,” Bush said. \nHe said the Democrat-controlled Congress disagrees with him, which is hurting Americans financially.\n“So far, (Congress is) acting like a teenager with a new credit card,” he said. “They believe in a federal solution to every problem. Somehow, that solution always seems to include raising taxes.” \nBush received applause from the crowd throughout the speech, but he received a standing ovation when he stressed the importance of fully funding the military overseas.\n“I don’t want our kids in uniform to think the President is playing politics with their lives,” he said.\nMike Sodrel, Republican candidate for Indiana’s 9th District congressional race, said he was impressed with the President’s speech. \nSodrel said he thought the President touched on all of the most important parts of the federal budget and economy. \n“If you look at the record, the (President’s) tax reductions actually created an increase in federal revenue,” he said.\nSodrel said he was especially impressed with Bush’s figures on reducing the budget deficit, though he acknowledged the national debt remains high.\nYet, Bush’s visit was not without its opponents. \nBaron Hill, the Democratic incumbent in the 9th District race, issued a public statement via e-mail after the speech. In the statement, Hill called the passing of the defense bill “a good first step,” but said he was disappointed in Bush’s veto of a bill he thought was critical to education, health and labor.\n“I am very disappointed in the President’s resistance to working with Congress,” he said in the statement. “I realize we have our differences and conflicting priorities, yet for the sake of the American people we must make progress.”\nJohn Sodrel, who said he was Mike Sodrel’s cousin, stood outside during Bush’s speech with a small group of protesters. He said that while he does not support the President’s economic policies, Bush’s treatment of the War in Iraq was more important to him.\n“President Bush has been a disaster since day one,” he said.\nBush’s speech lasted a little more than 25 minutes, after which the President took time to shake hands with some of the crowd before the Secret Service rushed him away. He was scheduled to leave from the Louisville International Airport on Tuesday afternoon.
(11/13/07 8:36pm)
UPDATE at 2:30 p.m.
(11/02/07 4:17pm)
Richard Shiffrin’s academic resume is, by almost anyone’s measure, distinguished. He has a bachelor’s degree from Yale University and a doctoral degree from Stanford University. He helped develop new theories on how we retrieve information from memory. After beginning his research and teaching career at IU in 1968, he founded the IU’s cognitive science program and became a distinguished professor in the department of psychological and brain sciences. \nBut on any given evening, you can find the 65-year-old professor hanging from a climbing rope halfway up a wall at Hoosier Heights, the Bloomington indoor rock climbing gym. \nRock climbing, and specifically routesetting, or constructing climbing routes indoors by arranging plastic holds on the vertical and overhanging walls, is Shiffrin’s non-academic passion. Shiffrin is the principal routesetter at the gym, which means he, along with only a select few other regular climbers, creates the routes everyone else climbs. While many people might assume Shiffrin sets his routes with slightly reckless young climbers in mind, in reality it is often IU employees who end up climbing on the holds he has set. At Hoosier Heights, a small group of IU-affiliated professionals has become a visible part of a growing climbing community. \nShiffrin said he began climbing about 12 years ago when a back problem made carrying a pack on hiking trips too painful. When Hoosier Heights opened in 1998, he said he noticed that there were not very many beginner-level climbing routes, which piqued his interest in setting such routes himself. \n“As I developed my climbing I also developed my routesetting, and I turned out to be a much better routesetter than a climber,” he said, laughing.\nNow, Shiffrin mostly uses his time at the gym to construct climbing routes up the walls to create any number of effects. Sometimes, Shiffrin’s goal is to set an easy route that first-time climbers can enjoy. Other times, the goal is to set a route so difficult only the most experienced and talented climbers can finish it. He always tries to place holds on the wall in such a way as to allow all climbers to move in creative ways that mimic climbing on natural rock. And there are plenty of IU employees ready to give his routes a try.\nThe reasons climbers such as Shiffrin climb at Hoosier Heights range from stress relief to the mental challenges the sport provides. This may explain why it seems to cater to more intellectual participants than other activities.\n“Climbing is not just a physical, repetitive activity,” said Nicole Schonemann, interim director of IU Community Outreach and Partnerships in Service-Learning. “It involves solving puzzles, so it’s always interesting and challenging.” \nIsaac Heacock, a graduate student in sociology who teaches a class on research \nmethods, agreed. \n“I think there is a unique mental challenge to climbing in the sense of figuring out how to solve a problem – how to figure out the sequence for a route,” he said. “Like, ‘How do I need to move my body in order to get up this wall?’” \nHoosier Heights currently allows students to put semester passes to the gym on their bursar accounts in an effort to attract IU students, but has no specific discounts or benefits for IU employees. Josh LaMar, a sophomore at IU and an employee at Hoosier Heights, said he thinks the gym is nonetheless popular with some IU employees because of the nature of rock climbing as an alternative sport. \n“More educated people could be interested in climbing because it’s kind of out there, and not something normal people do,” he said. Lamar was introduced to climbing by his father, Danny Rice who, fittingly, conducts research for IU’s Department of Biology. \nLindsay Watkins is the project manager for the Law School Study of Student Engagement, which examines effective educational practices for law schools as a part of the IU School of Education. She started climbing in Vermont, where she lived while in college, and began climbing regularly at Hoosier Heights when she moved to Bloomington. She said she thinks climbing might appeal to people affiliated with the university because the process of improving in climbing might mirror a larger desire for progress that is also found in academics. \n“If you climb a lot, you progress pretty steadily, usually,” Watkins said. “I’ve always sort of reached out (for new goals) and climbing is one way to do that.”\nYet for all its mental challenges, climbing may also serve as an escape from the day-to-day routine for IU employees.\n“You don’t need to think about school, you don’t need to think about writing a thesis, you don’t need to be thinking about the classes that you’re teaching,” said Tim VanHaitsma, who is pursuing a master’s degree in exercise physiology and teaches classes in both tennis and personal fitness. \nShiffrin said he hopes to continue setting routes at least until he turns 70. Whatever his personal reasons for doing so might be, it seems he’ll have plenty of fellow IU employees to climb them. \n“I do this in my off time,” Shiffrin said. “So when I get tired of doing intellectual activity at the university, I wander over (to Hoosier Heights) in the afternoon and set some routes.”
(11/02/07 4:04am)
A proposed $42 million expansion of Bloomington’s water treatment plant is described by the city’s utilities department as necessary to protect Bloomington’s clean water supply, but some local politicians – including mayoral candidate David Sabbagh – are reluctant to promote the plan without a second opinion.\nSome experts predict the city’s 40-year-old pumping and filtering plant might not be able to pump enough water to meet predictions about the amount of water students and residents will consume in the future. Without increasing pumping capabilities, Bloomington’s need could exceed its water-pumping capacity for a single day by 2010, according to its Long Range Water Capital Plan – presenting an increased likelihood the city could face water shortages. \nBloomington receives its water from Lake Monroe, which is large enough to provide more than enough water for residents, said Patrick Murphy, the director of the city’s utilities department. Yet while the city’s water supply is abundant, Murphy said the treatment plant may not be able to capitalize on the supply. \nThis plan calls for an expansion of the water treatment facility from one that can pump 24 million gallons per day to one that can pump 30, he said. Furthermore, the utilities department is recommending the city build another water pipeline as insurance should the current single line be damaged. The chamber of commerce, which currently opposes the plant expansion, is in favor of building this second pipeline. Murphy said the entire plan would cost about $42 million, with a goal of the expansion being completed near the end of 2011.\nMurphy said Bloomington \nresidents would likely see a 46 percent increase in their water bills to help pay for the expansion of the plant, which would be phased in over the course of two to three years. Bengston cautioned residents not to believe that their entire utilities bill would increase by 46 percent, however. The utilities bill that residents receive each month includes a bill for drinking water, storm sewers and wastewater, he said. It is only the drinking water portion of the bill that would increase. \nAccording to the department’s estimates, this would amount to an average $7 increase per monthly bill. \nDuring an unusually hot summer this year, the city had several days where water usage at peak times approached maximum pumping capacity, Murphy said. For example, on a day in late August, the plant pumped at its maximum capacity for 16 consecutive hours, according to the utilities department’s report. With projected population growth and forecasted continued effects of global warming, Murphy and others believe it is past time for Bloomington to expand the plant’s capacity. \n“I think we’re playing with fire here,” said Michael Bengston, assistant director of engineering for the utilities department. While some have already questioned the expansion’s timing, Bengston said the project is a matter of common sense. \n“It’s a difference in perspective (between) those who have to be responsible for this thing as opposed to those that really have no stake in it other than to snipe from the outside,” he said. Bengston said he thinks the city should take up the project immediately. \nOthers disagree. Sabbagh said he supports waiting for a second opinion before committing to the expansion. Currently, the utilities department’s plan relies on a report by an independent company that recommended a plant expansion, he said. Still, the mayoral candidate challenged the consulting and constructing firm Black and Veach’s recommendations, since the current proposal stands to land the company a multi-million dollar contract. \n“There’s no need to spend the money to expand the plant now if it’s not necessary,” he said. \n“We all agree we need more (pumping) capacity in the future, but it’s pretty easy to debate when that point is,” said Tim Henke, vice president of the Bloomington Utilities Service Board and member of the chamber of commerce. “If (the time to expand the plant is) ten years from now, we need to save the money. We have lots of other projects to do.”\nMayor Mark Kruzan supports the current plan – in part because he is not sure a second opinion would be more reliable than the first. If a second opinion came back against the plant expansion, that might require the city to look for a third, tie-breaking opinion, costing Bloomington more time and money, Kruzan said. It is a situation, he said, of acting early to avoid shortages in the long-run.\nWhile the utilities department describes the expansion as necessary for Bloomington’s future well-being, others also see the plan as beneficial to Bloomington business. \n“We want to make sure that when someone is looking at growing here we are going to be able to meet their needs (for water),” said Ron Walker, director of the Bloomington Economic Development Council. “If we can’t, they might go somewhere else, and if people go elsewhere, then you don’t grow your economy.” \nHenke, disagreed, saying the city might benefit more economically by saving money and not expanding the plant at this time. The city has not fully explored other options, he said, such as improving the pumping ability of the existing plant, or implementing voluntary conservation measures for days when water demand is particularly high. \n“Water that we supply is really a bargain,” Bengston said. “People are willing to pay a hundred dollars for their cable bill but they’re worrying about another $7 on their water bill.”\nExpanding the water treatment plant may well be the only viable way to prepare for the possibility that Bloomington will require more water in the future, Walker said. \n“There’s nothing in our laws in the state of Indiana that allow us to limit how much water people use,” Walker said. “So right now we need to make sure we can handle the supply that’s required by the community. That’s really it – it’s really just a long, slow growth, and the fact that we probably need to plan for continued growth.”
(08/24/07 4:02am)
Rear Adm. Adam Robinson, Jr.’s medical career that began with an undergraduate degree from IU will reach a high point Monday when he is promoted to the position of Surgeon General of the U.S. Navy.\n“It is my absolute honor and privilege to have been selected to lead such a wonderful team of men and women, and that is the team that makes up Navy medicine,” Robinson said.\nRobinson received his B.A. in political science from IU in 1972. In his course of studies he fulfilled his pre-medical school requirements and enrolled in IU’s Medical Science Program upon graduation. \nAs Surgeon General of the Navy and Chief of the Bureau of Medicine and Surgery, Robinson said he will help develop the Navy’s military policies, working with the Chief of Naval Operations to make decisions about military medicine.\nRobinson was nominated by President Bush to be the thirty-sixth Surgeon General of the Navy and will be sworn in next week. Previously, Robinson had been the commander of the Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Md. He called the Naval Medical Center the best in the country, but said he still owes much of what he has accomplished to his time in Bloomington.\nDuring his undergraduate career, Robinson caught the attention of Dr. Eugene Weinberg , a professor of microbiology, who recommended he enroll in the newly-formed Armed Forces Health Professions Scholarship Program as a way to help pay for his medical school. The military’s medicine programs tend to be progressive and efficient, Weinberg said.\n“The military, if it is not distracted by wars, usually knows what it’s doing,” Weinberg said. \nHaving served in the Army himself during World War II, Weinberg knew what the military could offer in terms of medical resources, and thought Robinson would benefit. Looking back, Robinson said he agreed with Weinberg, whom he considers a mentor.\n“Very few organizations can do the scale and the scope, the breadth and the depth of the types of work that we can do on the military side,” Robinson said of the Navy’s medical program.\nWeinberg said Robinson initially stuck out to him because of his ambition. \n“In any field, you can see some people who are very anxious to get their feet wet and get going,” Weinberg said. \nRobinson completed his first two years of medical school in Bloomington before spending his last two at the IU School of Medicine in Indianapolis. He said IU has played an immeasurable role in the person he has become. \n“It was the place that really awakened the crevices and the back corners of my mind. It was the launching pad for a lot of what I’ve done in life,” Robinson said. “I’ve had a wonderful career, and I’ve been very fortunate, and very blessed to have had the experiences and the opportunities I’ve had, and I attribute a lot of that to my beginnings at IU.”
(08/01/07 11:47pm)
The world’s most famous love story will take a Bloomington angle when Shakespeare’s “Romeo and Juliet” is performed in September on the outdoor Third Street Park stage. Auditions for the play, produced by The Monroe County Civic Theater, were hosted Monday and Tuesday at the park’s stage. \nDirector Russel McGee said he hopes to give the play a community feel by having the Montagues and Capulets, the play’s feuding families, dressed in Bloomington North and Bloomington High School South football jerseys.\n“It seemed pretty natural to take something from within the community that’s already there and utilize that for the basis of the story,” McGee said. “I’m not trying to change (the play), I’m just trying to put it into a modern setting so that people will be able to relate to it.”\nHigh school students from both Bloomington North and Bloomington South auditioned for roles in the play. Chloe Strauss, 13, will be a freshman at Bloomington North in the fall. She said she just finished “Seussical Jr.,” a musical based on Dr. Seuss’ books, on Sunday, which was also directed by McGee. She said she enjoyed working with the director enough to audition for “Romeo and Juliet” the very next day, even though she has not yet read the play.\n“It’s really hard if you’ve never read the material,” she said. “It’s pretty much one huge tongue-twister.”\nBoth Strauss and her friend Katherine McDaniel, 14, were auditioning for the role of Juliet, though both said they did not care much about the football rivalry between the two local high schools and had other ideas for the play.\n“I think Science Olympiad would be better (than football),” said McDaniel, who will be a sophomore at Bloomington High School North .\nMaya Wahrman, 14, is on the other side of the rivalry, as she will be a freshman at Bloomington High School South in the fall, but had similar thoughts.\n“On the one hand, I honestly don’t care about football,” she said. “But I think it’s a really big deal in Bloomington, the football rivalry between North and South, so I think (having the rivalry in the play) is a really good idea because it’s a big part of a lot of people’s lives.”\nTo add to the community theme of the play, McGee said he has offered the role of the prince to Bloomington Mayor Mark Kruzan. \n“All politicians have to be able to act a little bit,” McGee said, laughing. He said the role of the prince is not a major one, but it is important, because much of the conflict revolves around the character. \n“With his connection to the arts here in town, I knew it would be something he might be interested in,” McGee said.\nEven if the mayor cannot participate, McGee said he still hopes the community will support the production. The free performances are scheduled for September 14, 15, 20 and 21.
(02/12/07 2:06am)
IU students and Bloomington residents sipped coffee and nibbled on muffins and banana bread Saturday as they listened to a presentation by Fair Trade Bloomington about opening a fair-trade retail store in Bloomington.\nFair Trade Bloomington is a student group that focuses on raising awareness about fair trade, a business model aimed at helping workers in the Third World by paying the workers a larger proportion of the actual retail price of the products they make, said faculty advisor and apparel merchandising professor Mary Embry.\n"It is not convenient to support fair trade in Bloomington," Embry said after the presentation. She said that opening a store that would sell exclusively fair-trade merchandise would be a way of showing that globalization can be humane, sustainable and environmentally sound. \n"Fair trade is one solution to a whole basketful of globalization problems," she said. \nThe group's presentation, which also featured some student members as speakers, outlined the principles the proposed store would adhere to, as well as the logistical steps necessary for opening and running the store. Senior Nichole Common said the store would stock gift items such as textiles, jewelry, pottery and other items for the home and garden, since local retailers like Bloomingfoods and Sugar and Spice already sell fair trade food items. \nIn order to open the store, she said, the group first needs to file for 501(c)(3) status, which would designate it as a charitable, nonprofit organization, making donations and fundraising permissible. Common also explained that Fair Trade Bloomington will need to organize a five-person advisory board to run the store. The group will hold a meeting for potential board members March 24. \nEmbry outlined the fair trade principles the store would follow, which include selling goods that create opportunity for economically disadvantaged workers, paying workers up to 50 percent of the price of their product up front and focusing on improving working conditions, gender equity and environmental practices. \nA fair-trade store in Bloomington would not be the first of its kind in Indiana; Global Gifts, with two locations in Indianapolis, has been open 18 years and sells goods from 35 countries, Embry said. Global Gifts' success in Indianapolis demonstrates that fair trade could potentially be profitable in Bloomington as well, Embry said. \nMembers of Fair Trade Bloomington stressed the idea that fair trade is a way to make a positive difference in a world that sometimes seems impossible to impact. \n"Fair trade is a way of supporting the artisans who make these products, and I think it's so important that people in need are given the funding and the resources that we already have," said junior Lauren Perri, who is in her first semester as a part of the group. \nCommon agreed. \n"I think a lot of times students feel like they can't really accomplish much as far as making a change in the world," she said. "But just purchasing fair trade items makes a difference in somebody's life"
(12/01/06 5:11pm)
Two-time national champion Joe Dubuque left some enormous shoes for IU wrestlers to fill when he graduated last year, even though the 125-pounder has only size seven feet. \n"When people think Indiana 125, the face of that is Joe Dubuque," said Mike Peysakhovich, one of the IU wrestlers who looks to replace Dubuque at the 125-pound spot in coming seasons. "So when Dubuque graduates, the following year everyone is expecting that whoever fills in at that weight is going to be probably pretty good."\nPeysakhovich, a freshman, will redshirt this wrestling season, but he and others in the program are confident the IU wrestling team won't skip a beat when Dubuque's heir apparent, Angel Escobedo, gets a chance to prove himself. Escobedo redshirted last season while Dubuque finished out his eligibility. \n"He's definitely a very talented kid who's a hard worker," IU coach Duane Goldman said of Escobedo. "(He) is used to winning and has a winner's attitude."\nEscobedo was a four-time state champion in high school, tallying an impressive 174-1 record at Griffith High School in Griffith, Ind. In last weekend's Hoosier Duals, Escobedo was a perfect 5-0 in his matches.\nFollowing Dubuque, Escobedo's hopes for success are understandably optimistic, but Goldman said he doesn't put pressure on Escobedo to have the success of his predecessor right away.\n"At the national level, once a guy wins a national title and graduates, it's not always the case where the guy who was behind him fills in and starts winning nationals right away. There's not that mentality," Goldman said. "The pressure is just for (the 125-pound wrestlers) to continue to learn and do their best, but we're confident that if they're able to that, they'll have very successful seasons." \nGoldman might not put pressure on Escobedo to win a national championship right away, but that doesn't mean Escobedo isn't putting that pressure on himself. \n"My goals for this year are (to become an) All-American and become a national champ and help my team to be top five in the nation," Escobedo said. \nWhat will it take to achieve those goals? For one, Escobedo said he normally weighs around 150 pounds when he's not in wrestling shape, which means he has to put in "countless hours" of workouts to shed weight. \n"When everyone else is out there eating and drinking, you're sitting there starving," Escobedo said. "Waking up, going to class when you haven't eaten anything or drank anything, and you're starving -- it's just hard. It's discipline you have to keep up with. ... You hear a pop can open and you're just looking around. Or someone drinking something and you're like, 'Man, they better finish it all.' You notice little things like that." \nPeysakhovich, too, knows all about shedding weight, but he says it's not without its upside. \n"You don't cut the weight and go out there and get your ass kicked," he said. "Why cut that weight and get your ass beat for no reason? You cut that weight, and it makes you meaner and tougher and \nangrier, and your will to win is even greater." \nOn Thanksgiving, Escobedo said he worked out in the morning to cut weight for a weekend tournament. He said he had a small plate of food and two or three glasses of water with his coach to celebrate the holiday, but he was back working out in the evening to shed the last few pounds he needed to reach 125. \nEscobedo's Thanksgiving might have been a far cry from most other students', but he said he's willing to put in the work to reach his goals, which include winning not just national titles but an Olympic one as well. \n"There's a tremendous difference in character," he said of the difference between his team and normal students. "When I lived in the dorms last year, (and) I was going to bed, people were going out. I was waking up for workouts; people were coming in. It was just that difference. People are doing whatever, and you know you can't do the activities they do. You can't just go out and have fun because you have to get a workout in." \nEscobedo's work ethic has won him an important fan: Dubuque, now an assistant wrestling coach at Hofstra University, says Escobedo has what it takes to win at the national level. \n"You have to want it," Dubuque explained in a phone interview. "You have to be (a) hard-nosed, hard-working, relentless kid who just refuses to lose. I think Angel has a lot of those characteristics. ... He's got all the tools to be a four-time All-American and a four-time national champ." \nEscobedo said he still looks up to his mentor. \n"It's really hard to fill Joe Dubuque's shoes because there really is only one Joe Dubuque," Escobedo said. \nIf things go his way the next four years, people also might be saying there's only one Angel Escobedo.
(11/29/06 4:00pm)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>Sunday_8:21 p.m. It is the night before I will no longer be able to use the Internet. I am having mini panic attacks. Is there anything I need to do before I quit? I have a story due in a journalism class – what if I need to research for it? I have a test in philosophy on Tuesday – what if the teacher puts a message about it on Oncourse? I have an assignment for a sociology class, and the teacher said she will send an e-mail if there are any changes – what if I don’t get the e-mail? My heart is beating faster than usual, which strikes me as incredibly lame, but does not deter my opinion that there is no way a week without the Internet could be a good thing. 8:22 p.m.I check my e-mail, just to make sure I didn’t miss anything. There is an e-mail from my mom, which I read. My mom never writes anything I need to know. I should have known that before I read the e-mail. I delete it.8:24 p.m.I check Facebook. Normally, I don’t even really use Facebook. I realize I am overreacting to this whole ordeal.8:28 p.m.This undertaking seems like such an irrational thing to do; I decide to play some music to calm me down. I keep telling myself that this is stupid, and then I tell myself to shut up. Things alternate this way continuously. I never knew I was so addicted to the stupid Internet. Paul might be overreacting this early in the experiment, but Internet addiction is certainly very real.Dr. Hilarie Cash, cofounder of Internet/Computer Addiction Services in Redmond, Wash., says she was first introduced to the problem of Internet addiction in 1994, when few academics were writing or talking about it. The case involved a young man who was losing grip of his marriage because he was addicted to the online game, Dungeons & Dragons. Cash receives at least one or two calls a week from people around the country seeking help for an online addiction. They are mostly men preoccupied with video games or pornography, but Cash says women experience Internet addiction as well; they just aren’t calling her.“This addiction is something which is largely unrecognizable because it’s new,” she says. “So it’s really difficult for someone to know if they have a problem.”Nancy Stockton, director of Counseling and Psychological Services at the IU Health Center, says Internet addiction is different from addiction to, say, nicotine because it doesn’t have negative consequences in and of itself. Instead, the Internet robs time from human relationships and keeps people shut out from the real world. “Most of us need an escape from reality,” she says. “Some people lose control and escape way too much.”Still, online compulsion is less often a chief complaint at the IU Health Center than it is a contributing factor to other issues, like relationship problems. Rory Starks, a graduate student at IU studying immersive mediated environments, says those interpersonal issues only perpetuate Internet addiction. For example, people might spend a lot of time online and turn their friends away. This can result in them feeling lonelier, and therefore, they turn back to the Internet to fulfill that feeling of intimacy. “It can effectively snowball in certain people,” he says. “It can make them almost like a hermit.”Monday_7:42 a.m.My morning seems unusually empty since I routinely waste a good bit of it doing pointless things online. This leads to an important realization: There is no tool more efficient at wasting a few minutes than the Internet. It’s not like you say, “I have five minutes before I leave for class; I think I’ll read a book.” But you can check your e-mail and surf the Web for four or five minutes, which is what (I expect) many of us do when we have a little time to kill. You don’t actually accomplish anything; you just feel like you do. Maybe I’ll waste less time this week. Or, more likely, maybe I’ll just find new ways to waste time.7:50 a.m.I wonder what the weather will be like today. I cannot go to The Weather Channel’s Web site like I usually would, so I walk outside. This is a much nicer way to find out what the weather’s like than staring at a computer screen. Unfortunately, it looks like rain. 8:08 a.m.I head out the door for a short run before class. While running, I see my friend, George. Somehow, the first words out of my mouth are, “Hey, guess what I’m doing this week?” There is no way he’ll guess, so I tell him. “I’m going a week without the Internet.” He seems only mildly interested, which surprises me, since in my mind, my task is epic. He tells me that he already checked the weather this morning, and I can only assume he means he checked it online. “It’s going to rain,” he says. We part ways. There are two results of this interaction. One, I realize that it is impossible to totally avoid the Internet, even if it’s your intent. People will inevitably tell you things they learn or see online. Two, the Internet has created a false sense of security. George assumes that if the Internet says it will rain, it will rain. I, too, think it will rain because I stepped outside this morning, but George feels absolutely sure.Paul raises an interesting notion: We’re beginning to trust the Web more than what we can see and feel outside our doors. Cash says some people use the Internet as an escape from reality, and they fail to distinguish cyberspace from the physical world.She is concerned with people spending more time online than in the real world, where they obtain skills necessary for meaningful living – like being an effective husband, wife, or parent.She added that people who spend a lot of time using the Internet for recreational activities develop a desire for more external stimulation. They’re no longer comfortable with reading. They have shorter attention spans.“Moderation is the key,” she says. “Research is showing that two hours or less of recreational use of the Internet will not lead to harm, but more than that can lead to an addiction.”Tuesday_1:28 p.m. I am two minutes early to my meeting with my academic adviser, but she lets me in anyway. Again, even though I’m trying to avoid the Internet, I can’t escape it. She pulls up my transcript on the school’s server, and we talk about what classes I should take. It dawns on me that my mission may be doomed to fail since I have to register for classes on Friday, and I do not know if this is possible without using the Internet.3:47 p.m.I talk to one of my editors about registering for classes. He says I can do it without the internet if I go to the registrar’s office in Franklin Hall. I call Franklin Hall (via 855-IUIU, since I can’t look up the number myself) and ask if there is a way to register without the internet. The lady asks me to repeat myself to make sure she heard right. When I ask again, she says that the University no longer allows students to register without OneStart except for extreme cases. I wonder if an experiment for an article for INside counts as an “extreme case.” THURSDAY_1:07 p.m.A teacher asks how my week without the Internet is going. I tell her that it sounded like a good idea for a story, but it is more trouble than it’s worth. I don’t know who is trying to get ahold of me, I don’t know if I will be missing anything when I walk into any given class, and since e-mail is now considered official correspondence by IU, it seems like the risk I am taking by not keeping up with it could be pretty big. Here I learn another lesson: As a college student, going without Internet is a selfish undertaking. I am making other people’s lives more difficult, as well as my own. If anyone wants to get ahold of me and doesn’t know me very well, they have to go through all kinds of hoops to find me. My e-mail address is posted on IU’s directory. My cell phone and address are not.Paul is right to be concerned that without e-mail he will become unreachable. A recent congressional report states that “increasing numbers of Americans are becoming ‘wired’ and view e-mail as their preferred form of communication.” That said, nothing really substitutes for real face-to-face contact with people, says Dr. Stanley Wasserman, IU professor of sociology, psychology, and statistics. “The interactions you have (in person) are better psychologically than any other form of communication,” he says. “Body cues clearly are important, and you just don’t have those if all you’re doing is IM’ing somebody.”Wasserman points out that online communication is still a pool of study relatively untapped as far as social psychology is concerned.“I suspect people are going to be studying different communication patterns for years to come,” he says. “It’s revolutionary.”Cash, however, is on the forefront of that line of study. She says online communication modes provide a false sense of intimacy with another person. “It’s fine in limited doses,” she says. “It is not at all an adequate substitute for getting to know a person slowly and building a relationship. Intimacy is properly satisfied in face-to-face interaction with somebody that you can touch and hear and see and smell.”It’s OK to use online communication tools like AOL Instant Messenger to supplement a relationship, she says, but people need to get to know each other slowly, in person.1:30 p.m.I meet with an academic advisor, who I have to talk to in order to get permission to enroll in a certain sociology class. She says I could have simply e-mailed her to ask for the permission, and I remind her about my plight. She sighs and says she remembers, then goes onto her computer to give me the permission. She reminds me that although I was not physically sitting at the computer, I could not have gotten permission to enroll without her using the Internet, so I’m still reliant upon the Internet even though my mission is to avoid it. I tell her that this lesson has become very clear to me this week. She tells me to include it in my story. I will.2:30 p.m.I walk to Franklin Hall and into the Office of the Registrar. I ask the woman behind the big desk if there is any way I could possibly register for classes without using the Internet. “No.” She could not be any clearer about this. Reality sets in. My mission is irresolutely doomed to fail.The Web has evolved since Cash first became aware of Internet addiction more than a decade ago. The development of more psychologically sophisticated Web sites and online graphics for gaming and recreation – especially those with chat capabilities – is vaguely concerning to her. Cash wants to make sure people still care about what she calls “the real world” and sustain relationships with others by communicating in person.However, Starks said there have been studies where people with social anxieties were able to transfer communication skills they develop in cyberspace into real life.After all, he says, any means to get people to communicate is a good thing.Friday_9:30 a.m.I give up. I go online to check my classes. While I’m at it, I might as well check my e-mail. If I’ve gotta go down, I’m not gonna fight it.9:32 a.m.Whoa! Sixty-five e-mails! I check only the ones I think are urgent, but it’s nice to get rid of that feeling I’ve had all week that maybe I was missing something.Saturday_12:15I go online and surf the Net for a while. It’s a huge relief to know I’m back in the loop. It feels like I’ve been rescued from some faraway place and have been reintroduced to civilization.To go without the Internet is to constantly have your hands tied. In class, teachers constantly mention Web sites we should look up for information: Check such-and-such site for internship opportunities or such-and-such site for summer grants. Magazines and newspapers tell readers to check such-and-such Web site for more in-depth stories. Without the Internet, all this information disappears. Once I get back online, it’s all available again. That is what the Internet does for us now: It connects us to people, to distant places, and to information. In-and-of itself, that can’t be a bad thing.
(10/05/06 2:37am)
In a march Wednesday from the Indiana Memorial Union to Ballantine Hall, a group of 14 students protested IU's contract to sell Coca-Cola products. The students were members of No Sweat!, a student organization opposed to labor abuses and corporate globalization, according to the group's Web site. \nNo Sweat! protested the University's contract with Coke in response to ongoing allegations that Coca-Cola is part of human and environmental rights violations in several countries and that it had a hand in assassinating union leaders at a Coca-Cola bottling plant in Colombia. \n"It's not just a matter of treating workers badly," Ursula McTaggart, a graduate student part of No Sweat!, said. "Union leaders have been murdered, kidnapped (and) tortured in Colombia since 1989." \nSome marchers carried cardboard headstones with the names of the eight workers who No Sweat! claims have been killed in Coca-Cola bottling plants. \nOthers carried a life-sized cardboard coffin with "Coca-Killers" written on the front in Coke's trademark script. \nThe coffin was draped with a Colombian flag. "We're trying to raise aware\nness among the student body so that we can push the administration to not renew the contract with Coca-Cola unless (Coke is) willing to change their human rights policies," said senior Solomon Boyce, another member of the group.\nThe IDS reported in January that IU receives approximately $1.7 million annually from its contract with Coca-Cola. The contract is set to expire in 2009, according to the article. \ntion," said senior Cara Berg, who witnessed part of the march. "I think it's really excellent that No Sweat! continues to bring international issues to our atten\n"Often --our students are unaware of what's going on in the world."\nFreshman Kevin Sheehan said he thought the march was an effective way to bring attention to the charges against Coke since he was unaware of them before yesterday's protest. \n"It's not that often you see a coffin on the street corner," he said, pointing to the demonstration. "It's a cause I have not heard about. It's interesting, but before I\ngive any support I'd probably have to research it a little more to see what the facts are." \nOther students said they had already formed opinions about the soft-drink giant before the march. \n"I don't like Coca-Cola anyways because I heard it kills (workers)," freshman Jessica Harden said. \nSophomore Connor Shea said he was wary about IU canceling its contract with Coca-Cola because he has not seen hard evidence that Coke was directly related to the deaths in Colombia. He also said he is not sure that Coke is the only corporation capable of human rights abuses. \n"Pepsi might do the same stuff," he said. \nSenior Andrea Kopp voiced similar sentiments. \n"I would be concerned with what would happen if we changed our contract," she said. "Would we get a contract with someone else who has similar problems?" \nRegardless of whether the University takes notice of the march, McTaggart said No Sweat! would continue to try to educate students about IU's Coke contract. \n"You have to keep talking about (this issue) if people are going to be aware of it," she said.
(09/14/06 4:19am)
Haute couture is high fashion design. It's known for being expensive and impractical for day-to-day wear.\nStill, couture clothing -- the designs worn by runway models in the most exclusive fashion shows in the world -- influences fashion even on the IU campus and Bloomington streets, say some at IU. \n"Each season something gets picked up (from haute couture lines) and seems to be appropriate to come down the fashion chain until it gets down to the kind of clothing you could wear in Bloomington," said Kathleen Rowold, a professor in the Department of Apparel Merchandising and Interior Design.\nHaute couture literally refers only to custom clothing that comes out of a few design houses in Paris, but it is more often used to refer to any made-to-order outfit that's worn on the runway or red carpet or similarly exclusive setting, Rowold said. \nHaute couture, though, is slowly coming into the public eye at IU. For one, this year marks the first year that the Department of Apparel Merchandising is offering a certificate in fashion design, said Rowold. Then there's the recent success of Bravo's "Project Runway," where haute couture is often on display. All of a sudden, everyone's talking about fashion design.\nRowold said Americans' desire to look good is creating this buzz.\n"I think that right now in the culture in the United States, we are more than typically attuned to people's appearances," she said. "The people who are producing entertainment are really kind of cashing in on our desire to be beautiful, and I think that's where the whole fashion thing is happening."\nFreshman Alexandra Alvis came to IU specifically because it offered her a chance to major in fashion design through the Individualized Major Program. She said haute couture is significant for college students because it often inspires what they wear, even if students are unaware of styles' origins. \n"It's a huge impact," Alvis said. "You say, 'Chanel,' and everybody's like, 'Oooh!' Or '(Christian) Dior.' In pop culture, you see the girls with Dior purses and things."\nRowold agrees.\nShe said Burberry plaid is an example of this. Until recently, Burberry was considered conservative high design, said Rowold. In the last few years, it has been marketed as edgy, and now it's being worn by students on campus. \nEven if wearing couture-inspired clothing seems like a stretch, haute couture design is increasingly being seen as an art form, where creativity itself is worth something.\nBailey Redick, a senior majoring in fashion design, said she likes couture in part because of that artistic element.\n"You shouldn't have to follow any form or any sort of template," she said of designing clothes. "The couture designers get away from (that template) a little bit. ... It's another 3-D form of art."\nHaute couture can be seen as design that inspires fashion on the street, or it can be an artform itself. Ryan Gordon, a junior minoring in apparel merchandising, said it can also simply be a framework for students' own styles.\n"People should look to couture if they want to create their own fresh, individual style," he said. \nIf haute couture's popularity continues to rise, more students may be doing just that.
(08/24/06 4:27am)
When Americans hear the word "wallpaper," many may think of The Brady Bunch or bad kitchen designs. \nNama Rococo, a wallpaper company started by IU alums Karen Combs and April Combs Mann, is trying to change all that. \nCombs has been running Nama Rococo for only about a year, but people are already starting to take notice. The company's bold, bright colors and quirky designs have received press in The New York Times, Newsweek and other national publications.\nKaren Combs graduated from IU somewhere around 1981, though she said she can't remember the exact date. \n"It was one of those things where I had a few classes to finish up for a few years before I got the degree," she said in an e-mail. \nHer sister April followed in 1993. Both sisters graduated with a degree in fine arts with a focus on studio art, though April worked mostly with ceramics while Karen specialized in printmaking. After college, the sisters worked odd art-related jobs (between them they have worked with beads, books, bound journals and hats, among other mediums) and relocated from Bloomington to western Massachusetts, where their company is based.\nCombs said the years she spent working with various art projects gradually led her to come up with the idea to start Nama Rococo.\n"All roads kind of led to wallpaper," she said.\nOne of the major reasons Nama Rococo stands out among other wallpaper companies, Combs believes, is the care that goes into each panel of paper. Combs and several assistants hand-paint the background of the wallpaper before a screen-printed foreground is added. Due to the labor intensive process, Nama Rococo wallpaper is significantly more expensive than the traditional, store-bought variety.\n"Karen's wallpaper takes (wallpaper design) to another level," said Nathalie Chapple, a Los Angeles-based designer who used Nama Rococo paper to accent a popular LA bar. "It's not kitsch. It's just really good design, really good color, and it's done beautifully."\nCombs estimated that her paper may cost ten to 20 times what mass-produced paper is sold for, but said that hand-painting gives the paper a touch that is unattainable any other way.\n"It gives a devil-may-care feeling to the work," Combs said of painting the backgrounds by hand. "The tradition of wallpaper is a very uptight, rigid kind of thing, and one of the main things I'm trying to do is break down that rigidness, and open it up and make it a little more playful."\nCaleb Weintraub, an assistant professor in IU's School of Fine Arts said that while many IU students continue to create art after graduation, it's rare to be as commercially successful as Nama Rococo has been.\n"Most people who (graduate from the IU art) program continue to make art but probably few do it in the professional vein," he said. "The market is so slim that it's very hard to make a living on it." \nWeintraub said that IU's painting department places a heavy emphasis on art that can be shown in a gallery, but said hand-painted wallpaper like Nama Rococo's should still be considered an art form.\n"The idea of making hand-painted wallpaper is not artless at all," he said. "Making art that is utilitarian is not anti-art. It doesn't go against the motivation of what painting can be."\nIt seems more people are feeling this way. Combs said that some customers don't even bother covering an entire room with her paper, and that many of them simply buy a small sheet of it to frame as art itself. \n"Whether it's a room or a wall, (Nama Rococo wallpaper) makes a whole artwork, as opposed to having to frame a bunch of art or put up a sculpture or what have you," said Chapple, who added that she will continue using Nama Rococo in future design projects because of the Combs' artistic sensibilities.\nWith all the success they've had, the Combs sisters are ready to expand. April said that they may even begin working with furniture, since both she and Karen have ambitious visions for the future.\n"We always have ideas of what we'll do next, even if we don't know exactly what that is yet," she said.\nIf the past year is any indication, the future looks bright indeed.\nFor more information about Nama Rococo or to view their products, visit www.namarococo.com.
(07/05/06 11:21pm)
When Chris Johnston describes "ethical capitalism," the term he coined to describe his approach to running his Bloomington-based record label, Plan-It-X Records, it doesn't sound like a very good business plan.\n"Don't charge more than necessary," he offers as his advice to become an ethical capitalist. "Figure out what you need to maintain whatever project you're doing and make that the price. ... Unless you're increasing the quality of the product, there's no reason to increase the cost."\nPlan-It-X Records, which operates under those ignore-supply-and-demand principles, is proof that there are other reasons to run a business than just maximizing profit. Johnston's reasoning behind such a business model? He thinks art, and music specifically, is too important to simply become a commodity. Johnston said music today has become commercialized and he runs Plan-It-X so he can release bands he thinks should be heard but are not because they're not profitable for major labels.\nPlan-It-X's way of doing business is rare indeed, a sentiment expressed by David Waterman, a professor in the IU Department of Telecommunications who specializes in the economics of media.\n"It's not very common at all," Waterman said of Plan-It-X's business plan. "Lots of people start out with ideas like that, but usually they go out of business because they're not making enough money or else they change their mind; they convince themselves that the way to make a living is to charge higher prices."\nJohnston started Plan-It-X almost by accident in 1994 when he and a friend wanted to release a tape of Johnston's band. After designing the artwork that accompanied the tape, there was blank space left, so Johnston filled the rest of the area with a quick logo he designed for a then-imaginary record label, Plan-It-X. After this initial foray into production, Johnston got the idea to release an album by a band he met while he was on tour, and Plan-It-X was born as an official record label.\n"I never meant to start a record label," Johnston said. "I guess I'm doing it just because I like music."\nHowever, contrary to what Waterman said is typical, that principle -- releasing music for music's sake -- is still the reason Johnston runs Plan-It-X. He puts out the music he likes and thinks people should hear, not the most popular music or even the music he thinks will sell. Plan-It-X never charges more than $5 for a CD, and that price includes postage if the order is by mail. Johnston himself would rather not charge money at all -- he said his ideal society is anarchist -- but he has to cover the costs of the label.\n"I would love to not encounter money or deal with it in my life but it's impossible," he said. \nBut even so, Johnston does his best to make sure customers get their money's worth: Plan-It-X releases often come with stickers and a patch of the band, along with a full-length CD for that $5. \nAt least some people in the Bloomington music community are taking notice.\n"It functions very differently (than major labels)," said Peter Stran, who works as a manager at TD's CDs and LPs in Bloomington. "They have a DIY aesthetic whereas major labels don't."\nJohnston clearly doesn't feel the need to change.\n"We still make enough money to feed ourselves and release more music," Johnston wrote on the Plan-It-X Web site, www.plan-it-x.com. "CDs only cost about $2 to make. Think about that the next time you buy a $10 CD."\nMatt Tobey, who performs as solo musical act Matty Popchart on Plan-It-X, said he's supportive of Johnston's ideals, even if it means taking less money for himself.\n"After being involved with Plan-It-X and knowing how much it costs to make a CD, seeing big labels sell CDs for $12 to $20 seems really ridiculous," he said. "Ripping people off with something as important as music seems really wrong to me."\nJohnston is adamant that smaller record labels like his are important to music's survival. Major labels, he said, have too much to lose by taking risks on potentially controversial bands and are more concerned with making money than with producing good music.\n"I've never seen an example of a band going to a bigger label and reaching the masses or making an impact," he said. "Usually their lyrics just start to get toned down, they become more (mainstream) rock, they get more produced and lose every edge that ever made them appeal to people in the first place."\nJohnston doesn't spare MTV, either, in part because many bands he produces have particular political agendas that are frowned upon by large music companies like MTV.\n"MTV is not going to play your really badass political video," he said. "If it's in any way anti-capitalist or anti-shopping, or if any business could be offended by it in any way it won't get on the air."\nJohnston's views are good news for the Bloomington alternative music scene, which relies heavily on Plan-It-X bands. Besides the myriad of local shows that involve or are inspired by Plan-It-X musicians, Johnston is planning a festival to build community and showcase small punk bands. The event will be held beginning July 6 in Bloomington.\nAs for the more distant future, Johnston will continue running his business, his way -- music first.\n"I never think about the survivability of the business or what I can do to make sure we stay afloat, or if (a certain) record is going to crush the label by spending too much money on it," he said. "None of that ever comes up. It's a continual accident that keeps happening."\nIt may not be orthodox, but it's working for now.\n"Making as much money as you can pervades everything, so it's certainly a breath of fresh air when people demonstrate that they're not trying to do that," Waterman said. "It demonstrates very clearly that the artists are interested in their art and not trying to make a lot of money"