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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (April 2, 1981)
eatures THE BATTALION Page 13 THURSDAY, APRIL 2, 1981 Four types of eye disease make vision weaken is promft )urtdecisi iled that! ; By RUTH GRAVES Battalion Reporter If you’re an adult, there’s a 5 a or y~i lercent chance your vision is far rom perfect, says the National Society for the Prevention of Blindness. I The society uses the term Ivisual acuity,” which means d agn even dispul ty- laid. 5millionl rr , . . Ieil6cas u a person has a visual ed^anoi icuify of 20/50, this basically means that he can see clearly from 20 eetwhata person with •normal visual acuity can see clearly from 50 feet ) saw pict® le the HI 1 that soi uld happi 1-room schoolhouse returns ever feaj rving at 1 said, “ e situation jovemmeE nmittee productta govemmei whei mply how well a person sees. Recording to their estimate, five percent of adults have a visual acuity of 20/50 or worse. This scale of measurement does not indicate the vision a person has in each eye, as is commonly believed. Instead, if a person has a visual acuity of 20/50, this basical ly means that he can see clearly from 20 feet what a person with normal visual acuity can see clear ly from 50 feet. The main four problems caus ing poor visual acuity are: myopia, hyperopia, astigmatism and pre sbyopia, says Dr. James Smelley, a Houston opthamologist. All these are problems caused by faul ty refraction, the process of light forming an image on the retina. Smelley explained these prob lems. Myopia, or near-sightedness, occurs when light is refracted at a point inside the retina. In this situation, the eye is too long, so the focal point occurs in front of the retina. If a person has normal vision, refraction will occur at the retina. Myopia is corrected with concave lenses, which bring the point of refraction backwards to the retina. Hyperopia, or far-sightedness, occurs when light is refracted at a point behind the eye, as opposed to in front of it (which happens with myopia) or at the retina itself (which happens with normal vi sion). In the case of hyperopia, the eye is “too short, so the focus goes behind the retina.” Hyperopia is corrected with convex lenses, which move the point of refraction forward to the retina. Astigmatism occurs when there is distortion because the curvature of the eyeball is not consistent. Astigmatism of the eye may be basically myopic or hyperopic, de pending on whether most of the distorted refraction occurs in front of or behind the retina. Presbyopia, a form of hyper opia, occurs in virtually everyone Public awareness of visual acuity has tradi tionally been low, with public school testing and drivers' license testing being the only two widespread prog rams of visual testing. to some degree once they reach middle age. Presbyopia occurs when “lens elasticity is lost and the eye is fixed on a constant point.” This causes impairment of people’s ability to see objects close United Press International DAVIS, Calif. — While many > think aim iducators are working to get 1 you.” ehools back to the fundamentals, is secrets 18 youngsters are in the ultimate ministratil )ack-to-basics experiment — a me-room schoolhouse. They are the first-, second-and to Atlant hird-graders of Fairfield School, a ecturingai ed cinder block building in the ing engaj omato fields and pastures five dies west of Davis. Davis is a future-minded city mown for its progressive Univer ity of California campus. It seems n unlikely spot for a country "t/lTi l chool house — except that Fair- " p ield School is more than a throw- ack to the past. Its pupils could have attended lasses elsewhere, but parents hose the country school because key believe small is better. On Saturdays, they mow the lawn, wash the windows, mop the loorand make repairs to keep the cliool in business. Most expenses in accepts!! ^ paid by (be 5,000-student : because dry expeni Davis Unified School District and . ” ralunteer work accounts for the n fiscal IS. rest of the bill. be wants t ’[he youngsters work together igramcostsi i„ one room Outside, they, play illion aye* on a neatly trimmed field that was it 75 percei ifourfeetdeep in weeds before pa- iment wo® rents decided they wanted a com- more that iniimly school. The name goes back to 1865, len Fairfield School was It was rebuilt in 1910, in 1969 it was moved to a new building on its present two-acre cheese keep level. unmittee bpe, pleased Closed two years ago by budget el above® cuts in the wake of property tax were nects ire milk P [ ' : ' dashing Proposition 13, the school m reopened this fall after pa- at hand is® rats told the board of education hey could operate it for $30,000 id have flek|ess than the estimated cost, support 1 cent ration p r °!’ J propose* 1 once a x as the U t. 1, the fl fl support le' ban the pounds, k ProducJ )S ed that® between' rity dep el ture go’ iven >1 would d purel'ft were: ut it i s ” Block 4 titsfo< •ernmeu , can aL , ” he s# Parents have been performing daily and weekend chores ever since. During the week, they also volunteer as aides, crossing guards and playground super visors, and serve hot lunches that are bused from an elementary school a few miles away. Some families raise crops, horses or cattle. Others work in Davis or Sacramento but like liv ing on a few acres of their own in the country. A few parents are migrant farmworkers and their children are still learning to speak Enghsh. Pierre Mauer, 7, says he prefers his one-room school to more mod ern buildings with all their librar ies, audio-visual laboratories, lun chrooms and lots of classrooms. “It’s pretty nice here,” Pierre says. “There’s not so much noise, and cars aren’t zooming by all the time. You know all the kids be cause it’s not so crowded.” In Fairfield’s multigraded clas sroom, children work at their own pace, are highly motivated and learn better, teachers and parents say. The youngsters are too young to do heavy yard work, but they’re good at picking up papers. “They try to keep it neat around here,” says Shirley Huddleson, a veteran teacher who attended a one-room school herself as a youngster. “They know their parents are working around here and they don’t mess things up like some kids do who don’t feel any respon sibility. They know their parents are going to get after them — it’s a real family effort and there’s a dif ference in attitude.” Eileen O’Farrell, a volunteer who hopes to send a daughter to CROWN CENTRAL PETROLEUM COR PORATION, Producer, Refiner and Marketer of crude oil and products for over half a century is conducting: INTERVIEWS ON CAMPUS Tuesday, April 7.1981 CHEMICAL ENGINEERS PETROLEUM ENGINEERS GEOLOGISTS We, at Crown, depend on our people to give their best. That's why we provide them with competitive salaries, excellent advancement opportunities and great working conditions in the Sunbelt. For your On Campus Interview contact your Campus Placement Office NOW! If you are unable to make an interview, call or send your resume today to: Professional Recruiting Crown Central Petroleum Corporation 4747 Bellaire Boulevard, Suite 500 Bellcdre. Texas 77401 (713) 664-4133 Crown Central Petroleum Corporation An Equal Opportunity Employer M F Fairfield next year, adds: “The secret to a child’s success is having parents that care. And here, the parents are not only invited to care but told it’s their turn.” Would the Davis experiment work in the big city? O’Farrell thinks it would if pa- Hallmark Cards and Gift Center rsages • Cut (Frid^ • Cust • Silk Flo Dried A $2.00) and ements Flowers For All Occasions atch "Your Complete Florist" 707 Shopping Village 696-6713 D. R. 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Cain Company 3002 South Texas Avenue College Station Call 693-8850 weekdays 8:00 to 5:00 Call 693-8345 on Saturday to their eyes. This is the most com mon problem causing poor visual acuity. Public awareness of visual acui ty has traditionally been low, with public school testing and drivers’ license testing being the only two widespread programs of visual testing. College Station Independent School District, for instance, tries to test every child in the school district every year, said school nurse Diane Chester, but usually only tests about 90 percent of the students. Because of absenteeism, some children slip by without being tested. Chester said students are tested basically for near-sightedness (myopia) but are tested for far sightedness (hyperopia) if a prob lem is suspected. Astigmatism can be detected while performing a test for myopia, she said, because astigmatism is indicated when stu dents mistake letters in the test for other letters; for instance, chil dren with astigmatism might con fuse a C with an O or G. If the visual acuity test shows a problem, the student is retested. If frie test result remains the same 0& the second testing, the child’s tS are told he needs a profes- fcye examination, ter said in a grade level of Kimately 240 children, she wifi iiSually “pull 30 that need to be retested and of those I usually refer between 10 and 12.” r an Independent School Dis- las a similar testing program. Nter, high school nurse Mar- Gannon said high school stu- not routinely checked al acuity because most items are caught before a stu- n|reaches the high school level. However, new students who re gister at Bryan for the first time either take a school eye test ish proof that they have had ssional eye examination, trictl |ugh this type of visual test- children is frequent, adults ' given mandatory eye tests wh^m fhey renew their drivers’ licenses. Besides being infre- epient, this type of testing may not be. copiprehensive. However, there has been re cent publicity of an idea fostered by an opthamology professor at Stanford Medical School. Dr. Mil- ton Flocks has devised a plan for self eye exams via television that he says could detect 90 percent of eye defects. Flocks has been working with a $30,000 grant from the National Society for the Prevention of Blindness, and is in the final stages of testing his plan. If implemented. Flocks’ plan would include television eye tests with instructions for viewers. Af ter each test, an explanation of the results would be given. Because loss of visual acuity can be gradual, people may be una ware of the existence of their visual problems and might be mis sing out on being able to see well, said Smelley. “If you even think you might have an acuity problem,” Smelley said, “go ahead and have it check ed. You never know what you might be missing out on seeing. ” rents became involved, although she recalls that New Yorkers who filmed Fairfield School for nation al television joked about a one- room school on every block. They also complained about the flies that stray in from nearby cow bams. \ Greatest Name \ In Do-Huts \coffee7 (Offer good through April 30) DO-NUT SHOP 8 a.m.-6 p.m. Mon.-Sat. • Drive-Thru 7a.m.-1 p.m. Sun. APRIL LUNCH SPECIAL any Medium Drink Free with order of CHARBR0ILED SHIPLEY DELUXE (Double-Meat, Double-Cheese, served with lettuce, tomato, pickle and French Fries) “OUR SPECIALITY” 3310 S. 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