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The Battalion
Serving the University community
iad fim
Vol. 76 No. 40 USPS 045360 12 Pages
College Station, Texas
Tuesday, October 26, 1982
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'i* ./ or DENVER — Poison experts today
i , am ' <l identified a deadly mercury com-
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United Press International
mercury
Bnund as the substance that critically
injured a man who took poisoned Ex-
Kdrin capsules — the third case of
product tampering in Colorado in 24
hours.
emeswUlF J In Grand Junction, health officials
T I ■( ^ oncla > f° unc ‘ ,;it poison in
Palbottle of Maximum Strength Ana-
01 1 ( ) Ul f„«n, and local supermarkets removed
1 " l ar ', tr ',-„ Hfo/en pies after finding one that con-
7 , t K, i»ined a tranquilizer capsule.
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Officials of the Rocky Mountain
Poison Center and U.S. Food and
exas A&M
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1. in Kvle Fie«
Drug Administration said William
Sinkovic, 33, of Aurora developed se
vere intestinal pain and nausea Mon
day morning after taking three Extra
Strength Excedrin pills. He was hos
pitalized in “very critical” condition
early today.
RMPC Director Dr. Barry Rumack
at first thought the substance found
in the pain reliever was arsenic, but
further tests showed it was mercuric
chloride — a widely available, ex
tremely dangerous substance.
He said FDA investigators were re
moving bottles of Excedrin from
stores in the Denver metropolitan
area and X-raying the bottles to see if
any more contain mercuric chloride.
The tainted Excedrin and Anacin
capsules, coming SVs weeks after
seven people died from cyanide-laced
Extra-Strength Tylenol, were not im
mediately linked.
In Grand Junction, a city of 26,000
about 250 miles west of Denver where
hydrochloric acid was discovered re
cently in a bottle of Visine eye drops,
four supermarket chains removed
boxes of frozen Johnston pies after a
chocolate pie containing a tranquiliz
er capsule was found Sunday night.
mployers still recruit
ies despite recession
by David Johnson
Battalion Staff
I:; Recruiting at Texas A&M’s Place-
| jnent Center is down 20 percent this
[ year, but the University still is faring
Better than the rest of the country,
since recruiting is down 50 percent
nationwide.
| John Gudelman, associate director
f the Placement Center, said Texas
&M students get a high-quality edu-
ation and this helps them in the job
arket.
According to the latest statistics
ompiled by the center for the spring
land summer of 1982, 559 different
Itmployers — ranging from giant oil
Companies to the Central Intelligence
‘ gency — recruited here.
The center is on the 10th floor of
(Rudder Tower and has 33 rooms
here interviews go on almost con-
inuously. The center’s reception
irea, which is filled with slick recruit
ing brochures, bustles with well-
idressed recruiters and apprehensive
• students.
More than 2,000 students regis
tered with the center and took part in
almost 15,000 interviews with pros
pective employers this year. Agricul
ture, computer science, business and
engineering majors are the most
heavily recruited.
Technical and defense-related in
dustries, as well as many large agricul
tural companies, are doing well de
spite the economy, and are hiring
more students now than they have in
the past, Gudelman said. But many
petroleum engineering majors have
not been as lucky; there has been a
drop in a demand for them from oil
field supply firms.
Nancy Craig, a former Texas A&M
student who graduated last spring,
said she got her job with Arthur
Anderson Co., an accounting firm,
through the placement center after
interviewing with eight different
companies during one semester.
Craig now works as a greeter to
students interviewing with Arthur
Anderson. Interviewers generally
look for students who have a grade-
point ratio around 3.0, she said and
added that any extra-curricular acti
vities listed on a student’s resume are
helpful.
Cooperative education also helps
students find jobs.
Co-op students alternate working
at cooperating companies with going
to school. Students with more than 40
credit hours must have a 2.5 GPR and
students with between 30 and 40 cre
dit hours must have a 3.0 GPR to en
ter the program. Co-op students gen
erally take four and a half years, in
cluding summer school, to graduate.
“In the past, we had more jobs than
students,” said Karen Anders, assis
tant director of Cooperative Educa
tion.
But due to the increasing student
interest in the program, Anders said,
the jobs are now being filled on a one-
to-one basis.
Fifteen percent more students
have entered the program this year
than last year.
Co-op students from the College of
Business Administration, along with
electrical engineering majors, indust
rial engineering majors and compu
ter science students, have not suf
fered the decline in job offers that
other engineering students have had.
Anders said that because of the
scarcity of jobs, many graduates are
now keeping jobs offered to them
through the co-op program they
would have turned down a few years
ago.
Giving so others can live
Gatlen Sisk, a management sophomore
from Mount Pleasant, gives blood to the
Aggie Blood Drive Monday. The drive
ends Thursday; donors can give blood at
bloodmobiles near Sbisa and the Academic
and Agency Building from 8 a.m. to
5 p.m. Between noon and 9 p.m.,
donations are taken on the second floor
of the Memorial Student Center and in
Lounge A of the Quad.
Schmidt refuses to run
United Press International
BONN, West Germany — Former
West German Chancellor Helmut
Schmidt, brushing off efforts by party
officials to convince him to run, re
portedly feels too old to be a candi
date in elections scheduled for next
March.
“It is time for younger men to have
a go,” West German television Mon
day quoted Schmidt, 64, as saying be
fore entering a crucial meeting of
leaders of his Social Democratic Party
in which he outlined his future plans.
The party has unanimously re
quested the former chancellor to run
again for office in elections scheduled
by Chancellor Helmut Kohl’s new
conservative-liberal coalition govern
ment for March 6.
The former chancellor was ex
pected to make an official announce
ment of his decision today.
Since he was ousted from of fice in a
parliamentary vote of no confidence
Oct. 1 and replaced by Kohl, Schmidt
has told close aides that after eight
years as chancellor he is too old to run
again.
Schmidt was fitted with a heart
pacemaker last year.
Sources dose to Schmidt say he will
not run again because he fears a
further leftward drift in his party,
now considering closer links with the
anti-nuclear “Greens” Party that
opposes new nuclear missiles in West
Germany.
Schmidt has consistently backed a
NATO decision to deploy U.S. cruise
and Pershing 2 missiles if current
Geneva arms reduction talks with the
Soviet Union fail.
The former Chancellor is still West
Germany’s most popular politician,
according to opinion polls, and his
party has made intensive efforts to
persuade him to stand for election to
make use of his vote-winning ability.
A&M always luring faculty, he says
Vandiver slams prof publicity
From staff and wire reports
Texas A&M President Frank Van
diver says he is “a bit peeved” about
the publicity received over the Uni
versity’s offer to hire a Harvard Nobel
Prize winner.
In an article on the opinion page of
Monday’s Houston Chronicle, Van
diver wrote that Texas A&M was
offering high-paying packages to
professors long before it approached
Dr. Sheldon Glashow, a physicist who
shared the Nobel Prize in 1979.
“We are a bit peeved that the fact
that we are talking to him should be so
startling,” Vandiver wrote. “The fact
is, we are continually talking to pre
eminent faculty around the country
and trying to attract them.
“What apparently made the case of
Dr. Glashow different was a (media)
reference to a ‘Jackie Sherrill pack
age’ having been informally offered.”
Glashow was quoted in the Har
vard Crimson as saying: “In informal
discussions (Texas A&M officials) in
dicated they would probably match
those arrangements (made with Sher
rill).”
In an interview with The Battalion,
however, Glashow said he was mis
quoted and has not been offered a
package on par with Sherrill’s.
“There have been a lot of nonsen
sical statements made,” Glashow said.
However, he did say he has been in
contact with Texas A&M officials.
“There have been discussions at a
very general level about a permanent
assignment,” he said.
The attempt to attract Glashow to
Texas A&M is part of an effort to lure
outstanding faculty members to the
University.
Board of Regents Chairman H.R.
“Bum” Bright has said Texas A&M is
looking for faculty “superstars” —
especially professors who have won
the Nobel Prize.
“We have no Nobel Prize winners
now,” Bright said. “The University of
Texas has two and Harvard has eight.
We are trying to get one right now.’’
On campus
Pre-registration starts Nov. 15
Pre-registration for spring semester classes will be
Nov. 15 through Nov. 19. Procedures for pre-registration
will be the same as the last several semesters.
Assistant Registrar Donald D. Carter said about
25,000 to 27,000 students will pre-register. He said
students eligible to pre-register should register in
November rather than wait until January.
Students should check with their college or depart
ment for pre-registration procedures because each de
partment uses a different procedure, Carter said.
Before attempting to pre-register, students should
take care of any debts to the University, Carter said, or
their registration could be blocked.
Before signing up for classes, students also should
discuss what courses they plan to take with an adviser
from their department, he said. Adviser approval of a
course schedule is necessary to pre-register.
Spring class schedule books will be distributed in front
of Heaton Hall and Rudder Tower the week before pre
registration.
Heaton smokes; no fire found
Where there’s smoke, there’s fire. Or is there?
A secretary arrived at Heaton Hall at 7:10 a.m. Mon
day and found the upper hallway filled with smoke. A
room at the end of the hallway also was filled with smoke.
A fire alarm was sounded, and two College Station fire
trucks and an ambulance responded.
The building was evacuated and when it finally
opened at 9 a.m., the smokey odor still was strong.
Texas A&M electrical and mechanical inspectors sear
ched for several hours but couldn’t find the source of the
smoke.
Associate Registrar Donald D. Carter said: “They (the
Physical Plant Department) cannot determine the source
of the smoke. We have no idea what’s causing it. There
was no flame.”
Standing tall
st4ff photo by Robert Snider
The bonfire center pole went up Friday afternoon. The
pole is about 90 feet tall and extends 10 feet
underground. An outhouse will top the center pole
when bonfire construction is complete.
Faculty senate voting arranged
Faculty members who will be out of town during
absentee and general voting on ratification of the prop
osed faculty senate constitution may contact their col
leges’ faculty senate committee members for information
on special voting arrangements.
Gwen Elissalde, faculty senate steering committee
member, said some faculty members who will be absent
during voting times have asked about special voting
arrangements. Provisions for faculty members who will
be absent for all voting times will be discussed today at 3
p.m. in the Faculty Senate Steering Committee’s open
meeting in Rudder Auditorium.
Absentee voting will be Nov. 2 through 5 in 204CA
Sterling C. Evans Library. General voting wall be Nov. 9.
inside
Around town 4
Classified 6
National 8
Opinions 2
Sports 9
State 5
What’s up 8.
forecast
Continued clear and dry through
the weekend. High 70, low tonight
in mid 50s.
almanac
Today is Tuesday, Oct. 26, the
299th day of 1982 with 66 to follow.
American gospel singer Mahalia
Jackson was born Oct. 26, 1912.
On this date in history:
In 1825, the Erie Canal, Amer
ica’s first man-made waterway, was
opened for traffic between Buffalo
and Albany, N.Y.
In 1942, the American aircraft
carrier “Hornet” was sunk by
Japanese warships in a fierce naval
engagement off the Solomon Is
lands in the Pacific Theater of
World War II.