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(03/19/07 4:00am)
What would you do if someone gave you the deed to an island off the coast of Florida?\nKelley School of Business students now have the opportunity to play real-estate brokers, with the help of a $1.95 million gift of beachfront property from former IU student Stanley Benecki.\nBenecki, who graduated with a bachelor’s degree in real estate, donated the property to provide students with an opportunity to maximize the property’s value. \n“Mr. Benecki’s donation was a unique way to give back to his school and a creative way to teach students about real estate,” said Rex Davenport, the business school’s associate director of publications.\n“It gives them an opportunity to play developer by getting out there and figuring out ways to market and increase the lots’ value,” Benecki said in an IU news release. “When I was in school, we didn’t have hands-on opportunities to play with real estate – especially at these dollar amounts – and I think it will be exciting for students. It’s a real project. They’ll get to learn how to put things together, and that’s where real value is.”\nJeffrey Fisher, director of the Benecki Center for Real Estate Studies, said he is pleased with the thoughtfulness and kindness of his former student. Fisher, whose career began in the 1979-1980 school year, was a professor of Benecki’s and will lead the project. Benecki will serve as an adviser.\n“I am very pleased that Stan (Benecki) was willing to donate the property to support the real-estate program at Indiana University,” Fisher said. “It is nice to know that Stan felt that his education at Indiana University helped spawn his successful career.”\nThe island, inhabited by fewer than 100 Florida residents, is mostly owned and managed by the Nature Conservancy, an organization that collaborates with governments and other organizations to protect and preserve nature. The surrounding coves and bays harbor shipwrecks from colonial expansion. The island, which is accessible only by boat or plane, was formerly a haven for smugglers and pirates.\nBoth undergraduate and graduate students in the real-estate club will be able to participate, opening the project to students outside the Kelley school. Fisher also plans to travel to the island to assess its value personally, accompanied by a select number of students, he said.\n“(Students) will learn how to determine the optimal use for a site that is quite unusual and how to figure out who the potential buyers or developers would be and how to market to them,” Fisher said.\nAll proceeds from selling the island property will be given to the Kelley school, as a creative donation from Benecki.
(03/09/07 5:00am)
All over the state of Indiana, a new license plate design is popping up. Unbeknownst to many Indiana constituents, lawmakers passed House Enrolled Act 1013 on July 1 last year, which introduced a new license plate design available to the public on Jan. 1, according to a press release. The design includes the American flag and the words “In God We Trust.”\nRepublican Rep. Woody Burton, in collaboration with former Bureau of Motor Vehicles Commissioner Joel Silverman, decided to offer the plate design to Indiana residents without the specialty license plate fee that is usually charged, for example, for the environment, arts education, breast cancer awareness and other causes.\n“There are no fees because this is not considered a specialty plate,” Burton said. “This particular plate is what is referred to as a stock-shelf item, and is an extension of our nation’s motto.”\nThe state, in order to produce the license plate, requires at least 500 signatures on a petition to bring before the bureau. The “In God We Trust” license plate was granted $40,000 to begin production, and as of Wednesday has sold 207,391 plates, Burton said.\nUnlike the standard Indiana license plates, the county numbers are not displayed as the first two digits of the license-plate number, Burton said. Instead, the indication of county is on the bottom left corner, displayed as a small white sticker.\nIndiana is not the only state to implement such a plate. Burton said North Carolina, South Carolina, Arkansas, Tennessee and Louisiana all have similar plates, but that was unknown when the bill passed.\n“This nation was based on faith,” Burton said. “I don’t think that this plate is bias toward any particular religion, because if you look at them, there is no religion that doesn’t have a godlike figure. \nChristians, Catholics, Jews, Muslims and Buddhists all have a central god.”\nBurton did admit, however, that there was some minor controversy within the Jewish community about the plate. “(The Jewish community) had several questions about the plate and still had mild objections at the time that the \nbill was passed,” Burton said. “But I have a friend who is Jewish, and he just bought one of these plates.”\n“I’m really excited that \nso many people have bought these plates, ”Burton said. “It shows me that people are expressing themselves, and it gives \nthe public an opportunity to show their faith in their religion \nand their country. In the past few years, we’ve had attacks on faith, and the United States Supreme Court has been trying to get ‘In God We Trust’ off the dollar bill. There were even Christians jailed for putting \nfliers on vehicles at a gay pride rally.” \nThe license plate is currently available at local bureau’s branches and costs the same as the standard Indiana license plate. \n“People at the BMV have a choice, and no one’s going to push them to choose one plate over another,” Burton said. “If nonbelievers don’t want the ‘In God We Trust’ plate, then they don’t have to get it. I’m a Christian man, but I don’t have the right to force my beliefs onto another person.”
(03/08/07 5:00am)
For the second year in a row, all Indiana residents will spring forward their clocks Sunday from 2 a.m. to 3 a.m. for daylight saving time.\nAlthough an extra hour of daylight seems encouraging toward the end of winter, there are a few technological changes students should know about.\nChuck Aikman, University Information Technology Services manager and online support technician, encourages students, faculty and staff to keep their computer software updated to ensure a smooth switch for daylight saving time.\n“Because the start and end dates for (DST) are changing this year, most computer systems and applications need to be updated to recognize the new DST information,” Aikman said. “Most operating systems will need to be updated.” \nAikman suggested reading the UITS Knowledge Base article titled “At IU, how does the 2007 change in DST start and end times affect me?”\n“As an organization, UITS has spent hundreds of hours on DST. In addition to this recent change of start-end times, it was a huge effort to gear up our systems and support services for Indiana’s adoption of DST in 2006,” Aikman said. “This entailed research, testing, partnering with peer institutions and working with vendors. We also launched a huge communication campaign focused on documentation, information sharing and electronic communications.”\nCell phones, BlackBerries and Palm Pilots also need to be updated, according to the UITS Web site.\n“Cellular devices should receive updates for the correct time directly from the cellular network,” Aikman said. If the phone or PDA does not update, turn it off and on, he said. “If a device still fails to update, check with your service provider to ensure no extra steps are needed for your phone model.”\nUITS assures students there will be no major problems Monday morning.\n“In some cases, Monday will be as anxiously anticipated as Jan. 1, 2000, was for the Y2K crisis. There will be lots of early-morning testing and verification to ensure that the clock change occurred, and everything works,” Aikman said.\n“The days following the start of DST will likely yield some minor problems here and there,” he said. “As far as we know, we have done due diligence in preparing for this change, but there will undoubtedly be something that didn’t surface in a test or in our preparations. We will be ready to respond to such events.”\nFor more information about changing electronic devices for daylight saving time, visit UITS’s Knowledge Base article about the changes at http://kb.iu.edu/data/auve.html.
(03/08/07 5:00am)
Amid the racks of clothing, shelves of trinkets and walls of antique photos, Karen Cherrington glances around her vintage clothing store, Material Plane, 108 1/2 E. Kirkwood Ave.\n“I’ve been in this building for 20 years,” Cherrington said. “I wish I could stay longer, and I don’t think (the owners) realized that I’d been here that long.”\nCherrington is one of several business owners being evicted from her shop within Kirkwood’s Oddfellows building so that a private contractor can build apartment complexes in the space. She plans to relocate her store to the space occupied by Cherry Canary, 214 W. Fourth St., a vintage clothing store owned by her daughter, Cassandra Slone.\n“My daughter was looking for a way out of her lease since it was so expensive, and I needed a place to move to,” Cherrington said. “But the rent there will be twice as much, so I don’t know how that will turn out.”\nMaterial Plane is expected to be moved out by mid-April and into the new space by the first week of May. \n“Right now, both Material Plane and Cherry Canary are having half-price sales to cut down on all the things we’ll have to move out,” Cherrington said.\nThe city of Bloomington claims no involvement in the process of redeveloping the Oddfellows building. Director of Economic Development Danise Alano said the city takes great interest in protecting small local businesses in Bloomington.\n“This was a private transaction between a private seller and a private buyer. The city has no involvement, other than reviewing the development proposal,” she said. “It’s a misconception that the city is out to close local businesses. (Bloomington) is not in the business to close its stores.”\nBut business owners still have their doubts. \n“Kirkwood’s all going to be changed and the rent will be so expensive,” Cherrington said. “I don’t know who will be able to have stores here anymore. It’s the yuppification of Bloomington.”\nCherrington’s downstairs neighbor, Merribeth Fender, is also disappointment about having to move. Fender, who co-owns the gift shop Athena, said she would have to move out by March 28 and moved into her new space by the first week of April.\n“I had been looking for a new place to relocate anyways, and a few days after I had purchased our new shop, I was informed that I had to be out by the end of March,” Fender said.\nStill, after 14 years of business in the Oddfellows building, Fender is as melancholy as Cherrington.\n“They’re going to tear down the entire block next to us, where Ladyman’s was,” Fender said. “We’re very fortunate that at least they won’t tear this building down.”\nLadyman’s Cafe closed in December after the Heartland Development Group announced plans to build a parking garage in the area.\nCherrington said she had asked for an extension on her lease but was denied because of incoming construction workers.\n“We all knew that this move was coming,” Cherrington said. “We just didn’t think it would be so soon.”
(03/05/07 5:00am)
With a big smile and a charismatic personality, Robyn Ochs jumped head-first into her lecture on bisexuality. “What are some stereotypes that you have heard about bisexuals?” she asked the crowd of more than 50 students, teachers and Bloomington residents.\nWords like “indecisive” and “confused” were mentioned several times, as well as “fabulous in bed” and “can’t commit,” and even a few derogatory words. One person stated that she knew nothing of bisexuality, to which Ochs replied, “silence is loud, too, sometimes.” \nAfter hearing a comment that bisexuals have been heard to be curious, Ochs joked, “Oh, it’s just part of normal teenage experimentation. Don’t worry, dearies, you’ll grow out of it.”\nOchs, an advocate and activist for gay rights and equality, spoke at the Collins Coffeehouse last Thursday. Her lecture, titled “Bisexuality: Myths and Realities,” featured an interactive presentation and “experiment” using members of the audience to demonstrate the key points of her discussion.\n“Bisexuals are the second least popular group in America, after intravenous drug users,” Ochs said, quoting a 2002 psychological study done by University of California-Davis professor Gregory Herek titled “Heterosexuals’ Attitudes Toward Bisexual Men and Women in the United States.”\nTo teach the audience about the negative stigmas surrounding bisexuality, she gave each person a questionnaire to fill out. She then redistributed them anonymously through the audience.\nOchs used the Kinsey Scale, a line ranging from zero to six, with zero being “exclusively heterosexual” and six being “exclusively homosexual,” and had each person stand by the number his or her questionnaire corresponded with. \nThe results indicated the majority of people in the room was homosexual. \n“That’s interesting,” Ochs said. \n“But this is Collins!” sophomore Missy Ragatz joked. \nAs the experiment progressed, the number of people standing at the corresponding numbers to their surveys constantly changed. \nOchs’ interactive experiment showed that, while the majority of the audience was either gay or straight, there were still several members who considered themselves bisexual. “It’s not just black and white – there are a lot of shades of gray,” freshman Dylan Rivard said. “(The experiment) made me aware of the various intricacies that go into a person’s sexuality.”\nFreshman Blake Sohacki agreed. \n“It’s interesting to witness the alterations of the survey and program, and realize how related we all are in regards to sexual orientation and our insecurities within it,” he said.
(02/28/07 5:00am)
After four years of traveling to nine nations and more than 300 universities, internationally known speaker, teacher, writer and gay-rights advocate Robyn Ochs will speak at IU for the first time this week.\nIU’s Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Student Support Services, with assistance from the organizations OUT, Bi-Chat and Girls Like Us, will host Ochs’ presentation at 8 p.m. Thursday in the Collins Living-Learning Center Coffeehouse.\nThe lecture, titled “Bisexuality: Myths and Realities,” is a discussion open to all University students and faculty members about the facts and fictions of bisexuality, as well as gay, lesbian and heterosexual stereotypes.\n“Most of us have not been given good information about gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people,” Ochs said in an e-mail. “There is far too much misinformation and silence, and the purpose of my work is to break that silence, to provide information and resources and to start conversations that will make this world a safer place for everyone.”\nOchs, who taught classes about bisexuality and the politics of gender equality, taught at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology for one year, Tufts University for 11 years and Johnson State College for one year. According to her Web site, Ochs has taken a break from teaching since 2003 so she can fight for marriage equality.\nDan Coleman, an IU graduate student and programming coordinator at GLBTSSS, said he has seen Ochs speak before. \n“I chose her because she is not only quite an expert, but she is such a great person who helps to bring out the best energy in those who come in contact with her,” Coleman said. “(Her stories) are breathtaking and inspiring. She has the power to make an entire room cry with the story of her and her partner’s marriage.”\nOchs and her longtime partner, Peg Preble, wed in Massachusetts on May 17, 2004, the day same-sex marriages became legal in the state.\nOchs’ presentation Thursday will feature an interactive discussion on the definition of bisexuality and whether it exists as well as “biphobia” within communities of all sexual orientations.\n“Students will leave this program with a much clearer understanding of what bisexuality is and isn’t,” Ochs said. “I will do this in part by getting people to think about identity and labels in a much broader context. We humans are complicated, and the task of deciding how, or whether, to label ourselves is not a simple one.”\nOchs will be presenting another lecture called “I Now Pronounce You Equal” at 10:30 a.m. Friday in Ballantine Hall 006. This discussion will discuss the battle for same-sex marriage, including an extended question-and-answer session after the lecture.
(02/27/07 5:00am)
Eating disorders, including anorexia and bulimia, affect about half of all college women. And women at IU are no exception, said Luana Nan, a coordinator of Wednesday’s Celebrate Your Body Day.\nIU Counseling and Psychological Services is hosting the event Wednesday from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. in the School of Education atrium, Herman B Wells Library lobby and Foster-Gresham lobby, and from 4 to 7 p.m. in the Student Recreational Sports Center lobby.\nThe event is being held to promote positive self-image and awareness about eating disorders.\nNan, who is also an intern for CAPS, said the day is “an opportunity for students to exercise awareness about what our body does for us as an instrument of our life, and to reflect on the fundamental union between mind and body.”\nCreated so students can screen themselves for eating disorders, Celebrate Your Body Day provides students with evaluative questionnaires, self-acceptance exercises, information about eating disorders and on-site CAPS counselors to offer recommendations and resources.\n“I dislike the emphasis that our society in general, and media in particular, place on our body being an ornament for others, with more importance placed on physical beauty than on inner beauty, accompanied by certain standards for physical beauty,” Nan said in an e-mail. “For me, it is not only about our body being a vehicle for our being and moving in the world, but especially about our body being fraught with emotion and wisdom.”\nDeeDee Dayhoff, a faculty coordinator and CAPS therapist, said the event has been called Eating Disorders Screening Day in the past.\n“We wanted to focus more on body acceptance this year,” Dayhoff said, “so we are doing a few things differently, such as making the screening tool optional and shifting the attention to acceptance.”\nChances to win prizes will also be available for students who fill out the questionnaires.\n“We have a number of donations that local businesses have made to support this event and encourage student participation. Some of these businesses include Mira, (the Scholars Inn) Bakehouse, Malibu Grill and Suburban Lanes,” Dayhoff said. “Students who participate in this event will be registered to win gift certificates from these businesses.”\nBoth faculty and student organizers emphasized the importance of student participation in this event, and they encouraged all students to be involved.\n“Forty to 60 percent of college women have some level of disordered eating,” Nan said. “Each year the program is redesigned with the intention of reaching out to more students, sending out a stronger message and building a culture that embraces positive body image and self-care.”
(02/22/07 5:00am)
After only one semester, the IU African Languages Club boasts 71 members. Students and faculty members holding an interest in African languages responded enthusiastically to the formation of the club, which on Feb. 27 will hold its first event, the Africana Festival.\nThe Africana Festival – a daylong festival featuring dancing, music and food from Africa at the Neal-Marshall Black Culture Center, 275 N. Jordan Ave. – will be held Tuesday, Feb. 27.\nIn fall 2006, graduate students Abbie Hantgan and Chris R. Green formed the African Languages Club to promote African languages and ethnology.\nThe club provides African language students a forum to practice speaking with other students and native speakers. Hantgan, the club’s president, and Green, the vice president, also decided to integrate culture and lifestyle into the structure of the club. The intent was to welcome interested students who were not necessarily studying African languages already.\n“We want it to be a breeding ground of interest for younger students,” Green said. “We want students to know that they don’t have to fill their language credit with just Spanish, French or German – that there are more options out there.”\nAfter spending 3 1/2 years in the Peace Corps, Hantgan said she decided to enroll at IU because of the African Languages Program.\n“IU has such an amazing African languages program,” she said. “But professors are constantly under pressure to bring enrollment up. Our club is dedicated to promoting the African language department.”\nIU offers four African languages: Kiswahili, Twi, Zulu and Bambara/Bamana, at three levels each. IU’s is one of the largest programs of its kind in the nation.\nFor students, the club offers a gathering place to discuss African languages and culture.\n“A lot of members have been to Africa,” said member and graduate student Summer Tritt. \nTritt, a student of Twi, said she wanted to be part of the club and its experience directly relating to Africa.\nIn addition to the Festival, the club will participate in other events in the upcoming weeks.\nThe African Languages Festival is scheduled for April 13 and will include speakers who will read African poems and proverbs. The club anticipates sponsoring its own coffee hour sometime in April in the International Studies building. There will be performances from each African language class, including dancing and singing.\nClub leaders said they want the club to connect with the community.\n“We’d like to go to the elementary schools and talk to students about African languages and culture,” Hantgan said. “In schools, they spend a day talking about them but never really go further than that. We’d like to raise awareness about African languages.”\nGreen said he became interested in African languages because of their declining popularity on the continenet.\n“I chose African languages,” Green said, “because after colonization, the countries would just choose the language of the mother country and not the indigenous language. Because of that, they’re slowly starting to die out.”\nAll interested students and faculty members are encouraged to contact group leaders for more information about meetings and events.\nVisit the African Language Club’s Web site.
(02/22/07 5:00am)
With summer only a few months away, 65 summer camps from around the country are coming to IU seeking counselors, lifeguards and activity coordinators to employ. Job opportunities and summer internships are available through the 47th annual Summer Camp Job Fair.\nThe fair, sponsored by the Career Development Center and Arts and Sciences Career Services, will be held from noon to 3 p.m. today in Alumni Hall of the Indiana Memorial Union.\nThe event is open to IU Bloomington students and staff and city residents. The event is free for all to attend. \n“Everyone’s invited; it’s not just available to IU students and Bloomington. We’ve sent out publicity letters to universities all over the state, inviting them all to come,” said Dena Roberts, the event planning intern responsible for marketing and advertising.\n“We’re mostly targeting freshmen and sophomores, but there are some internship opportunities available,” Roberts said. “Mostly, it’s work experience.”\nAll majors and fields of study are encouraged to attend. \n“Students will gain responsibility and counseling skills if they do work at a summer camp for a summer,” Roberts said. “Working with kids and being in charge of people will make you a better leader.”\nFreshman Melanie Frank, a sociology major, plans to attend the job fair because she has “gone to the same camp for 11 years and want(s) a change of scenery.” \n“I’d like to work with kids in a different age group than I’ve worked with before,” Frank said. “It’d be interesting to work with kids from a different part of the country, too.”\nErin Erwin, assistant director at the Career Development Center, said many camps involved will collaborate with students to turn their experiences as counselors into internships at the camps. \n“Many students want an internship, so the camps work with them, adding extra responsibilities and tasks to give it a more internship feel,” she said.\nThe types of camps presented at the fair include day camps, traditional residential summer camps, adventure-oriented camps, camps for children with special needs, religiously based camps and camps for children of disadvantaged backgrounds.\n“This is a great event, with over 60 employers and hundreds and hundreds of job opportunities,” Erwin said. “Students can make money, not worry about housing for the summer, make long-term friendships and develop skills that will make them more marketable to future employers.”\nThe Summer Camp Job Fair also includes a raffle every hour, including a $150 voucher from STA Travel. Bike prizes, gift certificates from Dick’s Sporting Goods and IU Outdoor Adventures vouchers will also be up for raffle, Roberts said.
(02/15/07 4:57am)
Imagine beginning your summer in eastern California looking for ancient calderas, glaciers and alkaline lakes. Climbing dormant volcanoes and exploring Death Valley -- there isn't a boring day in this "classroom."\nOn May 16, between 14 and 18 undergraduate students will fly out of Indianapolis to Las Vegas for 15 days of intensive studies. These students will have taken only one eight-week prerequisite course but will learn the same material that juniors, seniors and graduate students of geology have been learning throughout college. The course is listed as IU Geological Sciences G188 and Collins Living-Learning Center L130.\nGeology professor Michael Hamburger teaches the course about the ancient environment of the Eastern Sierra Nevada mountain chain.\nHamburger developed the field trip in collaboration with Collins Living-Learning Center, but it isn't limited to Collins residents. Students of every major and background may participate, though they must apply.\nHamburger, an expert in geological processes and of the area, said it is a great teaching experience for himself and his colleague John Rupp, assistant director for research at the Indiana Geological Survey.\n"There are no boundaries of living and learning," Hamburger said. "It's a great hands-on environment."\nIsaac Simonelli, a former participant in the course, called the region's scenery "absolutely amazing."\n"The best part was understanding what's around you and understanding the processes that created it all," he said.\nSimonelli, a sophomore who went on the trip before he entered IU, applauded the teaching skills of Hamburger and Rupp. Simonelli said their vast knowledge in their fields helped them answer any question they were asked.\nBut Hamburger gives fair warning to students thinking about signing up for the course: They should not take it expecting it to be an easy science credit. \n"It's intense," Hamburger said. "You're in Death Valley one day, with 110-degree desert temperatures, and the next day you're on the top of the mountains observing the 5,000-year-old bristlecone pines, and it's snowing."\nThe trip is packed with daily expeditions to such sites as Yosemite Valley, the mile-high Dante's View, the Long Valley Caldera site and a hydrothermal power plant. From early in the morning to late at night, students are constantly exposed to "another planet," Hamburger said. \nTo apply, interested students must either obtain a copy of an application from Collins' office or apply online at the course's Web site. A letter of recommendation is required, students must academically sound and able to work intensively with a group for 15 days.\nGrades are based on reading and discussion during the prerequisite course, along with guided journal-writing and a written research paper.\nBut former students say not to be deterred by the workload.\n"The best advice I have for students thinking about going is to just go," Simonelli said. \n"Every day you see something new," said sophomore Nathan Brewer, who took the course last year. "The only problem is that it isn't long enough"