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(01/28/13 8:22pm)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>IU Cinema’s showing last Saturday night of “Chasing Ice,” a documentary about a photographer’s trip to Iceland to document climate change, was sold out. About 20 people in the stand-by line waited for tickets in the cinema’s small vestibule.Senior Adam Wolf was one attendee who came to the cinema after tickets sold out. Wolf had attended the Friday screening and came back Saturday to see it again. He said he has attended IU Cinema screenings before “Chasing Ice” as well.“I’m a big fan of intellectual films, art films and independent films,” said Wolf. “They have movies that appeal to me more than the mainstream.”Wolf said he considers himself a promoter of environmental conservation, which is why he returned to see “Chasing Ice” a second time. The film was part of the Cinema’s International Arthouse Series, which features critically acclaimed films such as “Beasts of the Southern Wild” and “Amour,” both of which have been nominated for a 2013 Academy Award for Best Picture.IU Cinema Director Jon Vickers said in an email that some filmmakers approach the cinema about showing their films, while others are invited to IU. Filmmakers do not pay the cinema for screenings, although some filmmakers may be paid for visiting and delivering a lecture. This is considered on a case-by-case basis.“We are not a rental house,” Vickers said. “We take responsibility for whatever we put on screen, and are trying to build trust in an audience. We know that everything that we program does not appeal to all, the reality of a diverse program, but hope that we communicate our program well enough to encourage or discourage audiences based on their individual tastes.”The IU Cinema has several series, including the City Lights series which features classic 20th century films, and the Underground Film series which features independent films. Both of these series are cosponsored by the Department of Communication and Culture.The program includes new and unreleased films as well as classic films. Upcoming films include “Out of the Past,” a crime drama from 1947, which will show on Saturday as part of the City Lights series. Christine Vachon, filmmaker and founder of production company Killer Films, will give a guest lecture on Friday.Vickers said that the goal of the IU Cinema is to serve as an art house cinema to showcase the best in new international, documentary and independent film. To that end, faculty looks at film festivals and new releases to find titles that are well received by critics and academically relevant.“We are very proud of our program, and what it tries to accomplish,” Vickers said. “We understand that many of our programs may not appeal to the casual movie-goer, but hope that there continues to be great opportunities for discovery.”
(01/28/13 4:19am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>The School for Informatics and Computing has several organizations that give students opportunities to network and gain experience in their field. Two of these organizations are just for female IT students. Women in Informatics and Computing serves graduate students, while uWIC is available for undergraduates.President of uWIC Alexandra Dye estimated about 150 of 1000 students in the SOIC are women. “It’s pretty male-dominated,” Dye said. “In a lot of my classes, there are only about five women.”Not all female SOIC students are interested in joining the organization, however.“There are women who say ‘I don’t need the support,’” Dye said.She said some wonder why there isn’t an organization exclusively for men in IT, but she thinks an organization to support women is necessary. There are other student organizations in the SOIC that accept both male and female members.“Since women are the minority, it really helps us,” Dye said. “I like that I can get together with other women who are interested in the same field that I am.”Next year, one floor in Forest Quad will be living learning community for female students studying technology, mathematics and the hard sciences (STM). Resident Assistant Valerie Herron said in an email that the LLC was a housing option for this school year, but was postponed because not enough students signed up. The eighteen students who applied are currently living in a thematic cluster in Read Center, and each resident has a graduate student mentor studying the same field. They also receive free tutoring and meet faculty from STM departments. “There definitely has been an interest in the floor,” Herron said. “It’s new this year, so it is still growing. Hopefully, now that it is getting more well-known on campus, more women will take advantage of the opportunity offered.”Dye said WIC and uWIC were restructured last semester. After asking female students what they would like to see happen, she and others found many women wanted to become more involved in WIC and uWIC.“We had a huge response, and now we have 26 people on the leadership council. Originally we just wanted six or seven women, but so many people wanted to get involved, and we didn’t want to turn anyone away,” Dye said.Dye said ideas for restructuring the organization started when she attended the Grace Hopper conference last year.“It’s a big conference for women to come together and celebrate women in technology,” Dye said. “There were a lot of schools and universities represented, and they had these big clubs. We aspired to be more like them.”The leadership council of WIC and uWIC has weekly meetings and creates one program for members per month. These programs involve events such as a career advisory meeting.“We have a career fair next week, so we had the career services director come in,” Dye said. “She had a PowerPoint and taught how to work the room and talk to potential interviewers.”Members of the organization who are not on the leadership council do not have regularly scheduled meetings. Instead, they receive emails from Maureen Biggers, assistant dean for diversity and education at the SOIC, and the leaders of WIC and uWIC with information about upcoming programs and opportunities.“We consider everyone a member whether they’re in meetings or not,” Biggers said.
(01/23/13 7:33pm)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>On Tuesday night students at Forest Residence Center participated in a life-size game of LIFE.The event was part of Forest’s Martin Luther King, Jr. Day celebrations, which also included a trip to the Buskirk-Chumley theater on January 21 to hear a speech by Carlotta LaNier from the Little Rock Nine.Forest Community Educator Esteban Garcia handed each player two strings of beads. Students were classified by the beads they wore, each of which symbolized a different aspect of personal identity such as economic status, race or sexual preference.Students began at the “education” table, where RAs passed out slips of paper symbolizing a high school diploma, an undergraduate college diploma or a graduate school diploma, depending on the students’ economic status. Students wearing green beads, which signified a low economic status, were told that they could only get a high school diploma. Students wearing gold beads, which signified wealth, were offered any education they wanted.Players proceeded to tables marked “Career”, “Family”, “Transportation”, “Housing” and “Vacation”. They were allowed to choose between four options at each table, but some choices had hidden consequences. For example, if a player was wearing purple beads, which signified that they were part of the GLBTQ community, they could not choose the “Vacation in Jamaica” option without being thrown in jail. This was meant to reflect real world consequences, said one RA host, because homosexual acts are illegal in Jamaica.Obstacles in the game included getting pulled over for speeding, unexpected pregnancy and getting caught robbing a bank, among other things.Throughout the game, participants received raffle tickets. At the end of the night, the RA sponsors drew three tickets to decide who would win the raffle prizes. Forest residents Jazz Bradley and sophomore Alex Leavelle both won Amazon gift cards and Rachel Brucker won a Kindle Fire.After the game, students were asked to participate in a discussion led by Garcia. He asked them if they felt they were treated fairly in the game, and most participants agreed that they did not. Garcia said he hoped students learned something from the event about treating people fairly regardless of their personal identity.One student participant was junior Tyler Bowers. He said he enjoyed the game and the discussion.“I learned that the rest of the people at Forest agree with me that we’re treated fairly here in Forest and at IU,” said Bowers.Forest RA Mischa Wee, who helped plan the event, said that the point of the event was to teach participants about unfair discrimination.“We wanted to create awareness of how people are treated based on their identity,” said Wee. “We all have differences. Seeing past them is important.”
(01/23/13 4:54am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>Due to a clerical error, the long awaited VOICE report will not be made public this week as originally planned.The VOICE report is a series of recommendations for administrative action based on the results of a campus-wide survey last March. The report would have been presented in front of the Dean of Students, provost and the IU president this Friday, roughly 10 months after the survey was taken.The survey was conducted by Campus Labs, an independent consulting firm.IU Student Association Chief of Staff Augustin Ruta and Senior Adviser to the President Jarad Winget were in charge of writing the report. Ruta said after putting the finishing touches on the report last week, they noticed a discrepancy in the demographic data Campus Labs sent them. Survey links had only been emailed to sophomores and juniors, Assistant Vice Provost Judith Iumet said in an email.This meant that the conclusions in the current report did not accurately reflect the opinions of the student body as a whole.“Seeing that 50 percent of our sample was not in our survey release, we felt we couldn’t release the results because they won’t be legitimate,” Winget said.Representatives of the company were unavailable for comment, but Ouimet was their primary contact on campus and was able to comment.“Campus Labs has acknowledged the error and is doing everything in its power to help IUSA obtain data from all students currently enrolled,” Ouimet said. “It is my understanding that Campus Labs is readministering the VOICE survey at no charge to rectify the situation.”IUSA funds were not used to hire Campus Labs, because the company was under contract with IU when the first survey was sent out by the Big Six administration in March 2012. The last administration spent $2700 on incentives, including an iPad, to encourage students to take the survey. Information on funding for incentives for the relaunched survey was not available at press time.IU students received an email with a link to the relaunched survey on Monday. Ruta said the survey will be open for two weeks.“Once that’s complete we’re going to go back in, polish the report, put new data in and see if any recommendations need to be changed,” he said.Winget said they do not plan to rewrite the entire report, but instead will compare the data in the report to the data collected from the new survey and make changes as needed.Ruta said it will take time to sift through the results of the updated survey, but the data will be more up-to-date than the results of the last survey.“It’s going to delay us about a month and a half, maybe two,” Ruta said. “But at the end of the day, we’ll going to have a better report from it.”There is no definite timeline for the report to be finished, but Ruta said that he and Winget will be working quickly to finish the report before the end of their administration.The publication of the report has been postponed until further notice. Ruta said they will present their findings to administration and then to IU students via email.
(01/22/13 4:37am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>At 8 a.m., guests began to trickle in to the IU Auditorium foyer, full of banquet tables covered in white tablecloths with red and white floral centerpieces. Deloice Holliday and Kathy Smith, co-chairs of the 2013 Martin Luther King Jr. Day Celebration Commission, stood at the podium at 8:30 a.m. to welcome guests. After an invocation by William Wiggins Jr., professor emeritus in the Department of African American and African Diaspora Studies, guests were dismissed by table to get breakfast from buffet tables in the next room.Guests at the breakfast included IU and Ivy Tech Community College students, as well as community representatives and IU administrators.Program coordinator Roberta Radovich said that due to the limited seating, attendees were required to reserve a seat before the meeting. Faculty members and selected city members were invited by the Celebration Commission, and interested students called ahead to reserve seats, she said.“We don’t do a mass invitation to students, but all the activities are free and open to the public,” Radovich said.Smith said she thinks it is important to commemorate King’s legacy, and having the leadership breakfast is part of IU’s recognition of King. “He would frequently have a prayer breakfast before he went out to do his work. We honor him in having that ourselves and prefacing the day’s activities with something that brings us all together in a community,” she said.Provost and Executive Vice President Lauren Robel opened the ceremony with a quote from King: “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.”Senior political science major Alicia Nieves, winner of the undergraduate division of the annual essay contest, read her essay to the crowd. In it, she linked King’s civil rights movement to the current movement of undocumented immigrants.Matthew Pfaff, who won in the graduate division, was at a student conference in Spain and was unavailable to present his essay.The breakfast included recognition of Building Bridges award winners. In his introduction of the winners, Celebration Commission Vice Chair David Hummons said that these awards went to people who were nominated because they embodied King’s passion for empowerment and social justice. Cameray Boyden won in the undergraduate student category, Samantha Schalk won in the graduate category and Kevin Brown won in the faculty category. The Bloomington chapter of the Delta Sigma Theta sorority won in the community category. Vice President of Diversity, Equity and Multicultural Affairs Ed Marshall delivered the closing remarks.“I think that it’s important that we use this day as a catalyst,” he said. “It’s nice to focus a day on volunteer service, but we need to take that to tomorrow and the tomorrows after it. We need to make a career of humanity, not just focus on one day and one speech, but use that to re-energize us as we go forward.”
(01/18/13 5:38am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>Of the 62 seats available in IU Student Association Congress, only about 35 are currently filled, Vice President for Congress Stephanie Kohls said. Currently, the representatives are trying to recruit more members to represent IU students, she said.“We lost a lot of people from winter graduation or class conflicts,” she said.Junior Sidney Fletcher is a congress representative for IU’s off-campus student constituency. He said he is concerned with the lack of contact between members of Congress and their constituencies.The constituencies of representatives are based on either geographical location such as Foster Quad, Union Street Apartments and off-campus students, or by academic department. Kohls said the number of representatives for each constituency is based on a census taken five years ago. For example, the Kelley School of Business has up to eight representatives.Congress has five committees. Each deals with a different issue. These range from sustainability to student affairs. Kohls said representatives are appointed to committees based on their interests.Fletcher said one way congress representatives could reach out to their constituencies would be a letter campaign from each representative or committee.“These letters would explain ‘This is what I’m doing in Congress, this is what I might be useful for, this is how to reach me,’” he said. “Hopefully those letters would go to each constituency in the University.”Fletcher said his idea has only been discussed between himself and other members of congress, not officially proposed.Students agreed there is a lack of communication between students and their representatives in student government, especially congress.IU students Audrey Webster and Kyra Betts both said they know almost nothing about the student congress.“I’d like to know what they’re planning to do to keep students involved in IU,” said Betts, a junior in the College of Arts and Sciences. “Prices are rising, especially tuition.”Betts said she would also like to know how the student government is dealing with diversity issues and with rumors about funding being cut to scholarship programs.Webster, a freshman in the School of Public Health, said she had heard a friend talk about running for a position in IUSA when she began her fall semester, but has not heard anything else about the student government recently.Kohls has been the Vice President for congress for two years. She said she works mainly as a communication liaison between the executive and legislative branches.“My role is to go to the meetings, give congress an executive report so they know what’s going on [in the executive branch]. Then for any work that’s being done in congress, I come to the executive branch and present the resolutions that are passed,” Kohls said.Like members of the executive branch, members of congress are elected or re-elected once a year. They may choose to run on a ticket with executive nominees, or they may choose to run alone. They do not receive a salary.Kohls and Fletcher both said that most people learn about joining IUSA and the campaign process via word of mouth.“If there are vacancies in the congress you can go to the executive branch and apply to become part of the congress,” Fletcher said.Fletcher said he thinks members of IUSA should work harder to reach students, especially students who may be interested in running for office.“Most people get involved because they know the executives,” he said. “I think that moving forward, that’s something IUSA should look at. How do we get more people, more students, involved?”
(01/16/13 4:17am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>After a study session in Herman B Wells Library, Lynette Anigbo joined a group with her son, who was born while she was an undergraduate sophomore. She was sitting in the library when Siobhan Carter-David introduced her to other student mothers, and they became friends. Carter-David introduced Anigbo to the group IU Student Moms.Anigbo, a graduate assistant at IU and member of IU Student Moms, said the group is an informal network, not a formal organization. The group does not get together for regular meetings, but occasionally meets to eat and talk together.“It’s really just a group of moms that help each other,” Anigbo said. “For me, this made it completely possible to do school and be a mom and still feel like I had a social life. I thought this group was the best thing that ever happened to me as a mom. I started to talk to other undergrads. It helped me to have that foundation.”She said that, in her experience, informal groups can be more effective. Connections to other student moms are usually made via word of mouth. Anigbo said Assistant Dean of Students Katrina Reynolds has been instrumental in directing women to the IU Student Moms group, and Associate Dean Carol McCord has also offered support when the group needs an advocate.“They are our administrative allies,” she said.Reynolds said Student Moms is based on a similar group on campus, IU Working Moms. This group was originally established in association with the Office for Women’s Affairs before it was disbanded. IU Working Moms has a website with information about upcoming events and a list of resources.“When you’re dealing with your kids, you want to have your close circle of moms that you go to and talk to about those things that are important to you,” Anigbo said. “Making sure everyone is connected to someone, that’s the most important thing.”Anigbo said the 10 to 11 women who currently make up IU Student Moms are a collection of undergraduate and graduate students, married and unmarried women. Although she takes opportunities to reach out to student mothers, Anigbo said not everyone is interested in joining the group.“Undergrads are really busy and may feel like they don’t have time to hang out with a group of moms,” Anigbo said. “I think it comes down to each individual woman and their experience as a mom.”Anigbo is in the process of creating what she calls a “Parent’s Packet,” which she hopes will be published online by the beginning of March and eventually published in print as well. The packet will include contact information and descriptions of resources available to student parents, such as daycares.For more information about joining Student Moms, contact Anigbo at 219-301-4014 or lanigbo@indiana.edu.
(01/14/13 5:46am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>Senior staff from the executive branches of ten Big Ten student governments, including the University of Maryland, met at IU for the Association of Big Ten Schools Conference this weekend to discuss issues affecting their campuses.According to the agenda, most of the major events, including four “breakout sessions” during the conference were scheduled for Saturday. These sessions were round-table discussions in which student delegates discussed issues such as campus safety, sustainability, governmental affairs and student advocacy.On Saturday, student leaders were seated in a circle in the Indiana Memorial Union Redbud Room, which was packed with office chairs. Some were sitting on tables that had been pushed to the wall because there were more delegates than chairs at the Student Advocacy breakout session.Facilitator Leslie Fasone began the meeting by asking, “What role do students play in student government? How are students’ voices heard?”“Student advocacy is shedding light on issues, urging some call to action,” said Kyle Straub, IU Student Association president. “Basically, it’s advocating for the voice and concerns of students and encouraging stronger integration of that voice within decision-making.”Despite the fact they were representing different universities, most delegates gave answers showing they shared similar concerns about student advocacy. These ranged from conflicts with the organization of student groups to ensuring students are civically engaged through programs like voter registration.The group also discussed the problem of engaging students to communicate what they want and expect from student government.The current IUSA administration has taken steps toward improving student outreach by creating the Campus Outreach branch of IUSA in April 2012 shortly after they were elected. IUSA Chief of Staff Augustin Ruta said the responsibility of Campus Outreach, led by Dia Sharma and Katy Flanigan, is to find out what students want from the student government.IUSA has also been working to engage students through projects such as a survey to collect data for the Vision of an Ideal College Experience, or VOICE, Report. The report is a compilation of recommendations for administrative action based on the survey data.“Finding quantitative data to understand what students want has proved very beneficial for us,” Straub said.Ruta said surveys were sent to 75 percent of students on IU’s campus via email through an independent consulting company called Campus Labs. “We had students identify the most critical needs and issues facing IU,” Ruta said.Citing the Culture of Care project, the Safe Ride program and the Tax-Free Textbooks initiative as examples, Straub said most of IUSA’s current initiatives align with conclusions drawn from this data. These conclusions will be published in the VOICE Report later this month. Straub said the VOICE report idea was well-received at the ABTS conference.“All of the schools were pretty much blown away by the power of the VOICE Report, and most showed some interest in adopting some portion of the process,” he said. Although student polling was suggested by several delegates at the meeting, other delegates also suggested using social media such as Twitter or Facebook to reach out to students. A representative of the Association of Students of Michigan State University said the ASMSA plans to use the Twitter hashtag “wtfMSU”, so students can concisely voice complaints or issues online.For students interested in voicing their concerns directly to the student government, the current IUSA administration has office hours from 7 to 9 p.m. every Monday night. Ruta said at least two or three senior staff members are available to talk to students at that time.Ruta also said the IUSA is passionate about engaging students civically and giving students a voice outside the IU campus.“Aside from being a IUSA representative, I would say talk to your senator, talk to your congressman,” Ruta said. “Write a letter telling them how you feel about higher education. The student voice is very powerful, and I think, sometimes, it might be under-utilized.”
(01/10/13 4:03am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>Though the Office for Women’s Affairs no longer exists in name, many of its services continue to exist.OWA was officially disbanded July 1, 2012, and the tasks and services it provided were assigned to other offices and facilities at IU.“I think the administration looked at the office and realized they were duplicating a lot of services,” said Katrina Reynolds, assistant dean of students. “They decided to consolidate.”Reynolds said that based on the recommendations of a committee of three former OWA deans and several women who worked with the office, the Office of the Provost made the decision to redistribute the OWA’s responsibilities.According to a brochure printed by the OWA, the mission of the office was to “provide advocacy services to women faculty, staff and students.”When it was operating, the OWA provided information and support for gender-related issues in the workplace and in the classroom. Reynolds currently works in the Office of the Dean of Students and does similar work, but only for students. She said some students did not know that OWA services were now being provided by the Dean of Students office and had to search to find them. She is trying to reach out to graduate and international students so they know where to go.“Undergraduates know to go to the Dean of Students, but graduate students don’t always think of that,” she said.When Reynolds worked with OWA, she handled cases of sexual assault, bullying, stalking and conflicts with supervisors or professors. She said she considered herself an advocate for staff and students.“We can’t fix all concerns, but we can be the place where they can be voiced,” Reynolds said. Although they are not consolidated in one office, these services are still available from different offices on campus. Catherine Dyar, chief of staff for the Office of the Provost, said students who need to access resources and services that the OWA provided should call either the Office of the Provost or the Office of the Dean of Students.“We are making sure no one gets lost in the shuffle and every issue is addressed where it needs to be,” Reynolds said.
(01/09/13 5:36am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>IU Student Association will lead the Association of Big Ten Schools conference, a gathering for the executives of student body governments from Big Ten universities. The conference will run Friday through Sunday.The ABTS conference occurs three times a year. Student delegates travel to different Big Ten universities for meetings in August and January. They meet a third time in the summer in Washington, D.C., for a conference called “Big Ten on the Hill.” IUSA president Kyle Straub said the conference is an opportunity for student leaders to network and share notes on projects they have launched.“A lot of ideas that we have adopted for our initiatives, including the SafeRide program, we got from past ABTS conferences, from speaking to other schools,” Straub said. Each active Big Ten school sends delegates from the senior staff of its student associations.“The networking is really helpful,” IUSA Chief of Staff Augustin Ruta said. “We have contacts, people that are sharing their knowledge of ways to get ideas passed and all their data, and that’s huge.”Ruta and Straub both said although different schools may have different problems, students on all these campuses generally have similar concerns.“Multiple Big Ten schools are working on governmental affairs, trying to get into the Statehouse and get their voice heard,” Ruta said.Ruta said the conference will include a guest lecture by J.T. Forbes, director of IU Alumni Association, and a leadership development workshop by R.J. Woodring, a former IUSA faculty adviser. Delegates will break into small groups twice on Saturday to talk about what Ruta calls “hot-button issues.” According to the agenda, they will be discussing campus safety and student advocacy.Straub said Dia Sharma, a member of IUSA senior staff, and Ruta were in charge of organizing the event. While Sharma said they did not have the exact amount of money IUSA was spending on the conference, the costs vary between schools.“IUSA did have some of the cost of ABTS included in our budget, but other schools also pay for each of their delegates to attend the conference,” she said. “Each student government’s contributions add up to cover the cost of the conference.”Ruta said this conference usually has a positive influence on Big Ten student governments. “We’re taking the knowledge that we have, and other schools are taking the knowledge that they have, and we’re all coming together to share and help each other,” Ruta said. Sharma said she is excited to take part in the conference this weekend.“It’s a great experience to meet fellow student government representatives and share your ideas with each other,” Sharma said. “We’re looking forward to collaborating and spending time with our fellow Big Ten student governments.”
(01/08/13 11:02pm)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>IU Student Association will lead the Association of Big Ten Schools conference, a gathering for the executives of student body governments from Big Ten universities. The conference will run Friday through Sunday.The ABTS conference occurs three times a year. Student delegates travel to different Big Ten universities for meetings in August and January. They meet a third time in the summer in Washington, D.C., for a conference called “Big Ten on the Hill.” IUSA president Kyle Straub said the conference is an opportunity for student leaders to network and share notes on projects they have launched.“A lot of ideas that we have adopted for our initiatives, including the SafeRide program, we got from past ABTS conferences, from speaking to other schools,” Straub said. Each active Big Ten school sends delegates from the senior staff of its student associations.“The networking is really helpful,” IUSA Chief of Staff Augustin Ruta said. “We have contacts, people that are sharing their knowledge of ways to get ideas passed, and all their data, and that’s huge.”Ruta and Straub both said although different schools may have different problems, students on all these campuses generally have similar concerns.“Multiple Big Ten schools are working on governmental affairs, trying to get into the Statehouse and get their voice heard,” Ruta said.Ruta said the conference will include a guest lecture by J.T. Forbes and a leadership development workshop by R.J. Woodring, a former IUSA faculty adviser. Delegates will break into small groups twice on Saturday to talk about what Ruta calls “hot-button issues.” According to the agenda, they will be discussing campus safety and student advocacy.Straub said Dia Sharma, a member of IUSA senior staff, and Ruta were in charge of organizing the event. While Sharma said they did not have the exact amount of money IUSA was spending on the conference, the costs vary between schools.“IUSA did have some of the cost of ABTS included in our budget, but other schools also pay for each of their delegates to attend the conference,” she said. “Each student government’s contributions add up to cover the cost of the conference.”Ruta said this conference usually has a positive influence on Big Ten student governments. “We’re taking the knowledge that we have, and other schools are taking the knowledge that they have, and we’re all coming together to share and help each other,” Ruta said. Sharma said she is excited to take part in the conference this weekend.“It’s a great experience to meet fellow student government representatives and share your ideas with each other,” Sharma said. “We’re looking forward to collaborating and spending time with our fellow Big Ten student governments.”
(01/08/13 4:54am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>IU Student Association plans to increase its campus-wide efforts on the Culture of Care initiative this semester. This campus outreach project intends to spread awareness of stigmatized issues such as mental health, drug and alcohol abuse, sexual assault and harassment or discrimination.Culture of Care is a $10,000 budget item for IUSA, according to documents released in October.The initiative began last year as a week-long event during Little 500. Each day focused on a different aspect of Culture of Care.“We wanted to encourage bystander intervention … looking out for your fellow Hoosier and making it your personal responsibility to make sure that people around you are being safe and being healthy,” said IUSA President Kyle Straub. “What we want to do this year is take what we learned from Culture of Care week last year and use that to make it more effective.”Dia Sharma, Culture of Care co-chair, said last semester was “mostly legwork.”Last fall, IUSA invited presidents of major organizations on campus to a leadership summit. “We want to encompass and understand a lot of problems on this campus, so we reached out to other student unions,” Sharma said. “We want to make sure they’re on board.”“Culture of Care is all about getting students to be proactive and avoid problem situations before they arise,” said IUSA Chief of Staff Augustin Ruta.In the upcoming semester, Sharma and her co-chair Katy Flanigan hope to do more to involve IU’s student body.“We’re hoping to host a speaker series featuring speakers that are related to each of our focuses,” Sharma said.They are also working on a website that would make information available to students.“Some people might not feel comfortable coming to the events or might not have time,” Sharma said. “It’s still in the development stages, but we want to make these resources available online.” Sharma and Flanigan want to reach out to students and ask them which issues they think are important in relation to the Culture of Care.“A lot of times students will come to us with issues, but one thing we want to work on is going to the students,” Sharma said.Straub is worried about the number of incidents related to Culture of Care issues that could have been prevented if students were aware of their rights and resources.There are growing numbers of incidents where people aren’t intervening because they aren’t sure if it’s acceptable, they aren’t sure what to do,” Straub said. “Some of these issues are really stigmatized, and they’ve never really been addressed by our student government.”Straub said he believes the initiative is already making a difference through projects like the Hoosier PACT and Lifeline, broader legal programs, which were largely achieved by last year’s administration to encourage people to report medical emergencies related to alcohol abuse without the deterrent of legal consequences.“We’ve seen at the local hospital that the number of alcohol-related incidents in which other people have intervened have skyrocketed. I don’t think people are drinking more. I think that the number of reported incidents has gone up because people have felt more empowered to intervene,” Straub said.“We want to create a conduit between groups on campus that have these problems in their communities and the services on campus that have the resources to help and combat these issues,” Sharma said.Although not many events related to the Culture of Care are scheduled for the upcoming semester, Ruta said that the focus is to change students’ mindsets and teach them to take preventative measures. “I think it’s easy for people to say that there’s nothing happening, but not everything is tangible,” said Ruta. “It’s a long-term initiative, it’s not going to be finished in two months.”
(01/04/13 5:19am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>Bags stuffed with personal hygiene products, thermal socks and granola bars lay on the floor of First United Church, waiting for the 60 Interfaith Winter Shelter guests spending the night there Dec. 11. The guests awoke to a bounty of unexpected Christmas gifts awaiting them, organized by volunteers from the Christian Student Fellowship house and spearheaded by Interfaith volunteer and IU senior Jessica Stephens. “Most of them didn’t have any idea that was going to happen. We brought it to them, they didn’t have to go anywhere or ask people to give them something,” Stephens said.The Interfaith Winter Shelter operates every night in Bloomington from 9 p.m. to 7 a.m. during the coldest months of the year, from October to April. Various faith-based organizations and churches house the shelter each night, rotating throughout the winter months. Stephens began volunteering with the shelter at the beginning of the fall semester, at the urging of her friends Brianna Underhill and Nolan Duffey, who also helped organize the gifts.Stephens said she was inspired one day while she and friends were serving food to a group of local individuals experiencing homelessness. One man asked for a coat, but Stephens and her friends did not have any to give.“There were flyers for a clothing drive so I suggested he go to that,” Stephens said.The man pointed out that the location of the clothing drive was at least 30 minutes away, and he had no transportation.“People asked for other things like toothpaste and combs, and I thought ‘I can get this for you, probably for free,’” Stephens said. “Their problem was that they weren’t able to get transportation to go pick up free items.”She decided to bring donations to the shelter’s guests instead of asking them to go to a second location. She and friends asked students from the CSF house to donate items of clothing.“It was right before Thanksgiving break,” Stephens said. “It was perfect timing, everyone was going home and I thought they could clean out their closets!” Students at the CSF house donated about half of the clothing needed, Stephens said. To buy the rest of the necessary supplies, she spent money of her own that would usually have gone toward her 10 percent offering at Sherwood Oaks Community Church.Volunteers who were not involved in the original donation drive contributed their time to the shelter, including IU senior Michael Deane.Deane volunteers at the shelter Monday nights with his roommate, IU student Georgia Boonshoft.“It’s a humbling thing seeing these people who are struggling. It really helps both me and my roommate keep things in perspective,” Deane said in an email.Deane helped pass out gifts the morning of Dec. 11. Each guest received lotion, two pairs of thermal socks and a toothbrush with toothpaste, as well as Christmas cookies and a Christmas card.“I got to personalize about half of them. Some of them just had a sentence like ‘I liked playing Euchre with you.’ It meant a lot to them. Most said that was the only Christmas card they would get that year,” Stephens said.Joanne Weddle of First Christian Church organizes volunteers on Friday nights, when FCC hosts the shelter.“Socks and gloves are always in demand during cold weather. Coats, too. Generally we don’t stock supplies of clothing, although if we have requests from people, we’ll help them find things that they need,” Weddle said.Thanks to the efforts of Stephens and other volunteers, each guest was able to look through the clothing that had been donated, choose what they needed, and put it in a new bag to store.“Jessica has a really big heart. You can see how much she cares about the guests that come into the shelters every night,” Deane said.Stephens said she is fueled by her desire to help the friends she has made while volunteering at the Interfaith Winter Shelter.“You love these people and they become like your family,” Stephens said.Stephens and Deane both highly recommend volunteering at the shelter.“School can be overwhelming, but at the end of the day we’re extremely lucky to be furthering our education and to have a warm house and bed to sleep in every night,” Deane said.The next training session for those interested in volunteering at the shelter is scheduled for Jan. 28 from 6 to 7 p.m., Weddle said. It will be held at First United Church on East Third Street.“We can use help anytime. We have had a lot of college student support, and it’s very appreciated,” Weddle said. “It’s a wonderful service they can give to our homeless population and to our community.”
(10/03/12 9:24pm)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>This is a kids’ movie with an interesting but poorly-used premise: Dracula (Sandler) runs a hotel for monsters, which doubles as a refuge from humans. When a human stumbles through the haunted woods into the hotel, Dracula has to hide him to protect the hotel’s reputation.The first half is funny, with jokes about monsters vacationing and Dracula scrambling to hide the human from the monsters. The second half is ruined by the awkward romantic subplot between the human and Dracula’s daughter.This movie had a cute premise and a few funny running gags, but it really isn’t worth seeing if you’re older than 10. I am not even sure what it was about. An overprotective dad learning to let his daughter leave the nest? True love? Or learning to live in harmony with people who aren’t like you?By Victoria Fater
(04/10/12 1:13am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>Members of local band Three Story Hill do not agree about how to define the band’s sound.Keyboardist Terrell Sparks calls it rock fused with rhythm and blues, guitarist Zach Luginbill said he thinks it’s R&B mixed with jazz, and vocalist Ariel Simpson calls it a layer of hip-hop and a jazz fusion with funk.“There’s not a band I’ve heard with the same sound we produce,” emcee Isaac “Young Prince” Lightfoot said. “We work hard to make our sound original while still covering other songs. We want to bring that feeling that original song gave while at the same time putting our original flair on it.”Luginbill and Lightfoot founded Three Story Hill after meeting at Musa Soundworks, a local recording studio. Luginbill said he is proud of the band’s eclectic sound.“I started recording hip-hop instrumentals on guitar and met Isaac at the studio where I was recording,” Luginbill said. “That was about a year ago, and our band has been together for about two months.”Three Story Hill is usually advertised as a cover band, but Simpson said the members plan to start focusing more on writing originals.“We’re working on some originals, but the demand is higher for cover bands,” Simpson said. “During shows, you have to kind of slide in the originals in between the covers.”Lightfoot and Simpson split the vocalist duties. “If there’s a song that has an MC/hip-hop thing, he’ll rap and I’ll sing the chorus,” Simpson said. “Then we switch and I’ll sing a song, and he’ll rap on the bridge. When we do original music, we take turns. We try to have vocal fusion.”Most of the band’s original music is composed by Luginbill. Three Story Hill has already recorded two original singles, “On Your Own” and “This Love.” Luginbill said they have several more songs in the works.“We’ve got about eight songs that will be coming out in the next two months,” he said.Three Story Hill played a show at the Dunnkirk on March 31.The band led off with a cover of “Empire State of Mind,” an anthem originally recorded by Jay-Z and Alicia Keys. The music caught the crowd’s attention immediately. “We try to cover R&B and pop music,” Simpson said. The upbeat rhythm filled the Dunnkirk, and the dance floor filled with people moving to the music and singing along.Three Story Hill has played at the bar, as well as several other local venues such as the Bluebird Nightclub and Jake’s Nightclub. Because the band has played only six shows so far, it is still developing a fan base.Junior Julianna McHale heard the band for the first time at the Dunnkirk.“I like them. I think they play good songs,” McHale said. “Ariel has a good voice. She’s soulful.” Band members said they are devoted to their music. Bass guitarist Karl Summers joked that they do almost nothing else.“We practice playing music, we listen to music,” he said. “When I’m not playing music, I’m listening to music.”Simpson said she agreed.“Our heart is in making good music,” Simpson said.