m Texas A&M mm W ®
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Vol. 89 No.36 USPS 045360 10 Pages
College Station, Texas
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Students query MSC manager
about student center expansion
Photo by Mike C. Mulvey
Steve Hodge explains details of the MSC expansion plan.
Beutel Health Center
modernizes operation
with computer system
By Holly Becka
Of The Battalion Staff
The manager of Texas A&M’s
University Center met a barrage
of questions and strong opinions
Thursday night as emotions ran
high during a public forum about
the MSC expansion plans.
University Center Manager
Steve Hodge discussed in a public
forum the plans for the $34 mil
lion expansion project, whose
construction begins in March.
About 70 people attended the fo
rum, and many of them ex
pressed unhappiness with aspects
of the project.
Most concerns were about the
relocation and demolition of oak
trees surrounding the MSC and
Rudder complex. Hodge said
that with the expansion five trees
will have to be demolished and 15
trees will be relocated on site,
while others will be relocated to
different areas on campus and
new trees will be added.
Hodge said Shade Trees of
Texas, a Houston firm, is the
company handling the moving of
the trees.
“We have done extensive work
with the company, and we feel
very strongly that trees of this age
can be moved successfully,” he
said. “(The company) has a track
record to prove it. They’ve
moved a hundred and sixty some
trees over the last five years and
they’ve lost one. They have
moved six trees of the size or
larger than the Rudder Oak.”
He said the trees to be relo
cated will be stored in boxes and
cared for daily during the two
years it will take to complete the
expansion.
James Storey, a professor with
A&M’s horticulture department,
said he does not believe the trees
can be moved successfully.
“In August, with the extremely
high temperatures and the loss of
the trees’ root systems, it’s going
to be difficult to get adequate wa
ter to the leaves of those trees (the
the boxes),” Storey said.
Students sat on the stairs in
Rudder Theater, waiting to come
up to microphones to voice their
opinions.
“Did the University try to talk
to any professors or department
heads about moving the trees?”
one student asked. “Did you get
any local imput?”
Hodge said the head of the for
estry department was asked for
his opinion.
“He told us all the trees were
on the decline and it wouldn’t
matter anyway,” Hodge said.
Another student said he
thought the University was not
making a big enough effort to
preserve green space on campus.
Hodge replied that if the Uni
versity had not been concerned
with the greenery, then “this all
would be a parking lot.”
“Parking lots are what we need
most anyway,” he said.
A woman student said she
thought the trees and the grass
around the MSC were a living
memorial to former students, and
therefore, it was unfounded to
destroy some of the trees and too
risky to move them.
Hodge said the MSC building
is the living memorial, not the
trees. Walking is not permitted
on the surrounding grass because
of Corps of Cadets tradition.
Student Mike Pinkus ad
dressed Hodge about a statement
he made comparing the oak trees
by the MSC to ones Aggies cut
and burn for bonfire.
“The trees they use for bonfire
don’t have people — Aggies —liv
ing under them, being under
them and doing whatever they
did under them for the past 100
years,” Pinkus said. “Now you
want to destroy them?”
Pinkus said he would chain
himself to the trees in protest of
See Expansion/Page 7
By Pam Mooman
Of The Battalion Staff
Computer technology will speed
up operations at A.P. Beutel Health
Center, making it easier for students
to see doctors and get relief.
“Computers will not, unfortu
nately, do away with all the paper
work,” T. P. Lackey, administrative
assistant to the health center direc
tor, said. “(But) it will speed things
up dramatically.”
Lackey said the computer system
will be set up by Nov. 1. Problems in
the system will be worked out in No
vember and December, and the sys
tem should be fully operational by
the spring semester, he said.
Lackey said the health center’s
priority is to process students
through the health center quickly.
“The first system brought on-line
will be the appointment system,”
Lackey said. “That’s one of the rea
sons we picked this system.”
Lackey said the system has a good
appointment package, so the health
center implemented its new appoint
ment system to try it out.
“The manual system is much
slower and cumbersome than the au
tomated system (will be),” Lackey
said. “I know now that many stu
dents are calling and (the phone) is
ringing and ringing.”
With the automated system, one
person will schedule telephone ap
pointments and one person will
schedule walk-in appointments.
Lackey said. Currently, one clerk is
responsible for all appointment re-
qusts, he said.
The new system also will speed up
test requests, electronically transmit
ting them from the doctor to the lab,
he said. If it is evident that a patient
will need tests, the nurse can send
the request ahead to the lab, he said.
“By the time the student gets to
the lab, the request will already be
there,” Lackey said.
The electronic transmission will
eliminate errors in interpreting
handwriting and save money on
printing materials, he said.
Lab results also will be more read
ily available for doctors to examine.
Lackey said. They will be able to pull
the results up on a computer screen.
“(The doctors) may be able to de
velop a diagnosis quicker,” he said.
Currently the doctors must wait for
the results to be delivered to them,
he said.
Student records will be compute
rized, although a paper copy will be
printed out after treatment is com
pleted, Lackey said.
Other areas to be computerized
include accounting and personnel
files, he said.
The computers also will save time
with a “key phrase” feature. Lackey
said. Two strokes on the keyboard
can bring up an entire paragraph.
“(Doctors) won’t have to type in
See Health/Page 8
orthern California feels
iftershock of great quake
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Four
[trong aftershocks rattled a jittery
JJorthern California on Thursday,
'and officials said the death toll at a
Jollapsed freeway might be far lower
han feared because the World Se
ries had reduced rush-hour traffic.
“Maybe we got lucky because of
game,” Oakland police Sgt. Bob
Crawford said. “Normally at 5
p’clock in the afternoon this area
Kould be bumper-to-bumper.
Maybe the World Series saved our
lives.”
Power and commuters returned
lo much of downtown San Francisco
p a tentative city tried to recover
^nd regroup following Tuesday’s
Earthquake, which officials said
flaimed scores of lives. An estimated
!,000 people were injured and prop
erty damage was put at $2.87 billion.
Residents of the ravaged Marina
district, furious at initially being bar
red from their homes, later lined up
for 15-minute passes to fetch cloth
ing, medicine, food and belongings.
At the UA-mile stretch of the col
lapsed double-deck Interstate 880
workers cut holes in concrete and
used cranes to pull out pancake-flat
cars. Rescuers reported finding the
cars as far apart as 60 feet.
That could lower the death toll in
the highway rubble — estimated ear
lier at 250, authorities said.
Firefighter Dan Getreu said he
had walked the length of the fallen
highway and estimated only about
two dozen cars were still trapped.
Americans send aid/Page 6
ISociology professor
Idocuments women,
rising salaries trend
By Julie Myers
|0f The Battalion Staff
By the time the female members
of the class of 1993 are ready to re-
Itire, their wages will be equal to
[men’s salaries, a faculty member of
[the sociology department said.
Dr. Samuel Cohn, who came to
[Texas A&M in August, recently be-
|came the first man to receive the
Jesse Barnard Award from the
[American Sociology Association.
The award recognizes a scholarly
[work that enlarges the horizons of
ciology to encompass fully the role
p)f women in society.
Cohn’s book, “The Process of Oc-
[cupational Sex Typing: The Femini-
Ization of Clerical Labor in Great
[Britain,” analyzes the feminization
of an occupation formerly domi-
[nated by men.
Cohn concluded that since a
pvoman in 1988 was paid 65 cents for
every man’s dollar and was therefore
cheaper to employ, only the firms
that could afford to be inefficient
would have discriminatory hiring
[policies toward women.
“Why would anyone hire a white
I male?” Cohn asks.
By hiring an equally qualified
[woman, the company could pay her
almost half as much. Usually
though, women aren’t hired in such
[situations because of a tradition to
discriminate against them.
ficient,” Cohn said.
Labor intensive industries need
the cheapest labor, he said, because
labor is one of their biggest ex
penses. Highly mechanized indus
tries, on the other hand, can afford
to discriminate because labor is a
small part of their budget.
In addition, Cohn said, women
fight discrimination from both the
rich and the poor social classes.
Although women working in
white-collar jobs cannot effectively
complain about wage discrepancies
because they risk their promotions,
those industries need to be con
cerned with their image
“People might just sue,” Cohn
said. “It is no mystery that the law
profession became one of the first
white-collar occupations to open up
to women. Women lawyers were
more knowledgeable about the
courts than female engineers, for ex
ample.”
The United States is entering a
more hostile corporate climate,
Cohn said. As the country stuggles
to compete with other industrialized
nations, companies will be forced to
hire more women.
Consequently, while female high
school graduates will have more job
opportunities at the lower ends of
the employment picture, male grad
uates will be faced with dimming
employment prospects, Cohn said.
Eventually women will gain wage
parity, Cohn said.
Wages depend on supply and de
mand, he said. As the demand for a
“Discrimination is massively inef- See Women/Page 8
Senate defeats flag-burning amendment
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Senate on
Thursday defeated a proposed constitutional
amendment to ban burning and desecration of
the American flag, dealing a sharp rebuff to
President Bush on an issue he had put in the
spotlight.
Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell, D-
Maine, said as the Senate defeated the amend
ment, “We do not serve our national tradition by
forcing Americans to make a false and unneces
sary choice between the flag and the Constitu
tion.”
However, Republican leader Bob Dole said, “I
think the flag should be flown at half-staff after
this vote.”
The White House said Bush was “disap
pointed” at the Senate’s action.
The proposal won a slight majority, 51-48, but
that was 15 votes short of the two-thirds of sen
ators present and voting that was needed for ap
proval.
Democrats led the opposition, but the vote was
hardly along strict party lines. Thirty-three Re
publicans and 18 Democrats voted for the mea
sure, while 11 Republicans and 37 Democrats op
posed it.
Congress gave final passage last week to a bill
to ban flag burning by simple statute. Bush said
he would allow it to become law without his sig
nature but added that he still thought a constitu
tional amendment was needed, that a mere law
wouldn’t withstand an expected new legal chal
lenge.
He had called for the constitutional amend
ment in June after the Supreme Court threw out
the conviction of Texas flag burner Gregory Lee
Johnson on grounds that a Texas flag-burning
law violated his constitutional right of freedom of
speech.
Arguing broke out between the parties even
after the vote as Democrats charged that Bush
and GOP National Chairman Lee Atwater had
pushed the amendment to put pressure on them.
“He has used his high office for a low purpose,”
Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, D-Mass., said of Bush.
But Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., noted that 18
Democrats had supported the measure. “I do not
think this is a partisan matter that is being engi
neered for crass political purposes.”
The argument that the issue could be a potent
election weapon against senators who opposed
the amendment appeared to lose steam this
week.
Mitchell told reporters Thursday morning be
fore the vote that the outcome, by then sure, was
due to the “sound judgment of the American
people.” Other lawmakers said most Americans
apparently are not overly interested in the pro
posed amendment.
The measure would have authorized state and
federal governments to ban burning and dese
cration of the flag. Critics said the danger to the
flag was not as great as to the Bill of Rights.
“For 200 years, they have protected the liber
ties of Americans through economic turmoil,
civil war, political strife, social upheaval and in
ternational tension,” Mitchell said.
Photo by Mike C. Mulvey
Face It
Tabb Tidmore, senior industrial distribution major from Bryan, store in Post Oak Mall. Tidmore chooses from an array of celeb-
models a “Friday the 13th”-type Halloween mask a la Jason at a rities and ghouls including a Satanic demon and Richard Nixon.