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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (March 27, 1990)
rch 26, xpect arrt. TexasA&MT*% 4_ __ 1 • __ 16 Battalion WEATHER TOMORROW’S FORECAST: Mostly cloudy with a chance of thunder showers. HIGH: 68 LOW: 58 meantc? Vol.89 No.118 USPS 045360 10 Pages scowcor IJ ™ College Station, Texas alreadj kj to s,m\ t Soviet er/y critici; was intent: king to ret er they tit tout the fit it democr; Anatolvi Breathe! iops,baci grams at s an op Photo by Fredrick D. Joe James Sexton,23, braves Monday’s mid-50 degree weather to Cain Pool is open from 12-6:30 p.m. seven days a week. The swim in Cain Pool. Sexton is a Blinn student studying English. swim fee is one dollar with a Texas A&M ID and two dollars with- Sexton says he likes to swim because “It gets you in shape fast.” out one. Cain Pool, of course, is heated. Fee" 550/51 Library expands to west campus 455/47: 10/11 32/35 45/55 35/4i 10/12 10/12 Officials say plan will relieve overcrowding, noise By PAM MOOMAN Of The Battalion Staff The Sterling C. Evans library is moving on — to the west side of campus, that is. The library expansion, which opened March 19, is on the first floor of the Biochemistry Building. Hours are: 8 a.m. to 1 1 p.m. Mon day to Thursday, 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. Friday, 9 a.m. to 6 P-m. Saturday and 1 p.m. to 11 p.m. Sunday. Evelyn Aldred, head of the re serve department, said most reserve material in the library expansion will come from departments on the west side of campus. “Students who spend most of their time on the west side of campus will use this room,” she said. John Barer, head of the circula tion division, said the expansion will provide study space and reserve material for west campus students. However, anyone is free to use the new library facility. Barer said the Evans library was pressed for space. In the evenings and on weekends it was crowded and noisy, he said. Attempts to relieve this pressure were made by opening snack bars for late-night studiers, he said, but he was not sure this has relieved li brary crowding. Tne expansion will relieve pres sure from the main library because it has materials that students on west campus need. Students Can study in the new fa cility and a snack bar is right around the corner if hunger pangs arise while engaging in academic pursuits. As the A&M campus grows, it is expanding west, Barer said. Many buildings are being constructed, and a large number of classes are there. So the Evans library is expanding along with the University. “This is an attempt to provide li brary services closer to their locale,” he said. There also is better parking on the west side of campus, Barer said, so the expansion will be more conve nient in that way, too. The same policies of borrowing materials at the main library will ap ply at the new facility. University and library officials saw the benefits of relieving the pressure on the main library by pro viding the west campus facility, he said. Barer believes this new service- oriented policy will continue. “We saw a need for more library services there,” Barer said. “And this is only the beginning.” Tuesday, March 27,1990 Construction forces cadets out of Quad Members may move into ramp of non-reg Hart Hall in fall By NADJA SABAWALA Of The Battalion Staff Home is where the heart is, but for some residents of Hart Hall, home may mean sharing their dor- m itory with the Corps of Cadets. Sixteen rooms in Hart Hall have been allocated to the corps for use this fall because of increasing de mands made by the prospective size of the incoming class and the lack of corps housing, said Tom Murray, as sistant director of Student Affairs. Murray said the decision is the re sult of an effort between Student Af fairs, Student Services and the corps commandant’s office. “The decision was made after the commandant’s office investigated that they will need the space,” Mur ray said. “They said they are expect ing between 2,300 and 2,400 mem bers.” The University is beginning the rennovation of two corridor-style halls in the Quadrangle, leaving only 10 halls available. These 12 dorms house approximatly 2,500 to 2,600 students and with the increase in numbers, more space could be needed. The 16 rooms the corps may take over in Hart presently house 32 resi dents who will have to be relocated elsewhere and will have priority in housing preferance. The plan is not definite, he said, but if the corps needs the room, ac cess will be available. If there is no demand, those students who are re located will have the priority to re turn, Murray said. Hart Hall is built with “ramps,” meaning each section is separate and the only way to get from one ramp to another is through an outside en trance. Murray said the area re served for the corps is J-ramp, which has some of the larger rooms in the hall. Murray said the ramp was chosen because of its proximity to the Quad rangle, because it was done in 1981 with good results and because the style of the hall would allow the resi dents to be separated. John McKinnie, a senior electrical engineering major and president oF Hart Hall in the fall of 1988, said he understood the corps will try to keep everything as separate as possible. “It’s my understanding that we won’t be responsible for them,” Mc Kinnie said. “It’s like it’s not even going to be a part of Hart Hall.” He said the ramp will probably have its own exterior door locks with a different key cut from the rest of the hall. Murray said the cadets will con tinue to fall under the government of the corps, they will just be living outside of the corps area. Current Hart Hall President Bryan Reilly, a senior accounting major, said his major concern with corps members moving in is that the dorm has had problems with some cadets before and he disapproves of them moving into the dorm itself. “We’ve had problems with them running by in the morning and knocking on windows and being really loud,” Reilly said. “The major thing is that they can have the run of campus,” he said. “It feels like the corps can just take over whatever they like.” McKinnie said he believed that quite a few Hart Hall residents were members of the corps and got out for some of the same reasons that make residents apprehensive of hav ing members move in. McKinnie said that if he were given the preference, he would rather have seniors in the ramp. “We would rather have it the up perclassmen,” McKinnie said. “There’s not going to be a lot of stuff like what goes on between the soph omores and freshmen and the noise level wouldn’t be as bad.” McKinnie said he wasn’t aware of any communication between hall representatives and the corps and there are still some minor questions that are unanswered. Murray said the situation is still being worked out and compromises will nave to be made by both the corps and the dorm. Majority of college students pass TASP test )ad. F<x 5. ure ike. bargain iicrafe ny fine Mayan fishing land by rays on tionin- icludes nights Deluxe ocean- ind the diving dives. FORT WORTH (AP) — Texas educators were surprised to hear that three-fourths of the first group of college students to take a state-man dated academic skills test passed it. Some had predicted dismal failure rates — as high as 46 percent — in last year’s Texas Aca demic Skills Program testing, which assesses reading, writing and math levels, the Fort Worth Star-Telegram reported Monday. The TASP test was given five times in 1989 to a total of 56,781 students, and 76 percent passed all three sections, the newspaper said. The passing rate statewide for reading was 92 percent; for math, 85 percent; and for writing, 85 percent. “On the tryout, it was much more ominous,” said Joan Matthews, who coordinates the skills test for the Texas Higher Education Coordinat ing Board. “The passing rates are higher than originally anticipated, but you have to qualify that because it still is not a representative group.” The test became a requirement last year for •Black, Hispanic enrollment rises /Page 3 first-time college students in state institutions and students planning to become teachers. One reason for the higher-than-expected scores is that teacher education students made up a greater than normal percentage of the pool, Matthews said. The education students did well on the test because they already have had at least two years of college, she said. This year, college students with nine hours of courses will be required to take the test. Many were exempted under a grandfather clause that excluded students with at least three hours of col lege credit. Others also took a pre-test that ex cluded them from the mandatory exam until they had 15 hours of college credit. “I think it will be sometime next year before we have a representative group of people,” tak ing the test, Matthews said. While not a consideration for college admis sion, the test was implemented to ensure that stu dents entering college have sufficient basic skills to succeed. The purpose is to identify those who need remedial courses. Between 120,000 and 180,000 students are ex pected to take the test each year. More black and Hispanic students failed the test than did Anglo students, the newspaper said. Only 52 percent of the black students ana 65 per cent of the Hispanic students passed all three sec tions, compared with the 83 percent of the Anglo students who passed all three sections. However, once those students are placed in re mediation programs, they quickly are brought up to par with their Anglo counterparts, Matthews said. The Texas Education Agency plans to distrib ute the TASP scores to the 1,600 high schools statewide so they will know how their graduates performed. Crews continue cleanup of30,000gallons Intracoastal Waterway reopens after oil spill FREEPORT (AP) — Cleanup crews Monday continued mopping up more than 30,000 gallons of crude oil from a barge rupture that forced officials to close the Intra coastal Waterway. U.S. Coast Guard Lt. Cmdr. Frank Whipple said officials re opened the waterway to one-way tra ffic about 11:30 a.m. Monday after shutting it down for 16 hours be cause of the spill. “We’re allowing one-way traffic — eastbound and westbound, but only one at a time,” Whipple said Monday afternoon. “The cleanup is still going on,” Whipple said. “We had to bring the booms (used to contain the spill) down that crossed the Intracoastal Waterway to reopen it. “But we still have some booms leading into marina and boat slips.” He said owners, LeBeouf Broth ers Towing Co. of Huoma, La., planned to complete the oil cleanup efforts by Monday night. The barge was carrying a light grade of crude oil called condensate, which is extracted from natural gas wells. “We were really lucky,” Whipple said. “It was a real light condensate and it evaporates quickly and it hap pened in a place where the access is very good. “There are many areas of the In tercoastal Canal where this cleanup would have been impossible.” The 190-foot barge, MB 2, was en route from Mobile, Ala., to Corpus Christi loaded with crude for Koch Fuel Oil when it struck a sunken ves sel about 6:15 p.m. Sunday. Whipple said the abandoned ves sel “is not submerged — you can see it.” But he said the tugboat pilot “in making that turn, his tow swung wide and clipped the corners of the abandoned vessel.” The vessel spewed 830 barrels, or 34,869 gallons of light crude into the waterway, by 10 p.m., when work crews were able to stop the leak, said Coast Guard Lt. Mike Debetten- court. “It’s not as bad as we might have feared,” Debettencourt said. “It seems to be not too bad, con sidering.” Most of the damaged barge’s cargo was safely stored within its hull, and later was pumped into an empty barge, Debettencourt said. The leaking barge was located about one-tjuarter mile west of the Surfside Bridge in Freeport, a town of about 12,000 people 40 miles south of Houston. The Gulf Intracoastal Waterway parallels the Texas coast for 432 miles from Sabine Pass to Brownsville. A marina and industrial area are located near the barge accident, as are environmentally sensitive wet land and marshland areas. We were really lucky. It was a real light condensate and it evaporates quickly and it happened in a place where the access is very good. There are many areas of the Intercoastal Canal where this cleanup would have been impossible.” — Frank Whipple, Coast Guard Lt. Cmdr. A&M officials form informative panel By PAM MOOMAN Of The Battalion Staff The 1990 spring Graduate Stu dent Conference will FOCIS on issues important to all Texas A&M students. Panel members will discuss their jobs and answer questions wur main objective is to see what everybody’s working on and see if we can’t collect those up and work together.” —Dan Vrudny, Graduate Student Council president before invited guests from 7 to 9 p.m. Wednesday and Thursday. “(We’ll) see if we can’t find some common ground,” Dan Vrudny, president of the Grad uate Student Council, said. “(We’ll) see if we can’t work to gether on some things.” The Graduate Student Council is co-sponsoring FOCIS, Forum On Campus Issues, with Student Government. The first conference was last year, and Vrudny said the partici pants wanted it to be twice this year, once in the fall and once in the spring. “The reception last year went really well,” Vrudny said. How ever, a fall program was unable to be organized. But Vrudny said the Graduate Student Council plans to use a committee to plan future conferences, keep better records and have two conferences next year. Vrudny said panel members will give a five-minute presenta tion on what they do for Texas A&M students. Participants were invited because they represent many different issues that are im portant to all Aggies, he said. A moderator will be present to keep the informal discussion from becoming a debate. Invited panel members are: A&M President William H. Mob ley; William Stout, deputy speaker of the Faculty Senate; John Koldus, vice president of Student Services; Dean Gage, act ing provost; Bob Wiatt, director of the University Police Depart ment; Jim Jeter, associate exec utive director of the Association of Former Students; Raul Fer nandez of the Board of Regents; and Kenneth Dirks, director of the A.P. Beutel Health Center. Student leaders who also will form a panel are: Kevin Buch- man, student body president; Ty Clevenger, speaker of the Stu dent Senate; Diana Galindo, pres ident of the International Stu dent Association; Leah Hanselka, RHA president; Scot Walker, edi tor of The Battalion; Keith Pow ell of OCA; Matthew Poling, Corps Commander; Jason Wil cox, president of the MSC Stu dent Council; and Vrudny. “Our main objective is to see what everybody’s working on and see if we can’t collect those up and “I If we have four or five organizations working on the same issue, we won’t get anything done.” — Dan Vrudny, Graduate Student Councilpresident work together,” Vrudny said. “If we have four or five organiza tions working on the same issue, we won’t get anything done.” Invited participants represent variotis campus groups that focus on general issues, he said. “Our intentions are just to get the ideas flowing,” Vrudny said. “We’re really excited about get ting this off the ground.”