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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Sept. 6, 1995)
mber6, Wednesday • September 6, 1995 Page 5 • The Battalion ior: ck uptrajl Companies are set tiXVPatthe MSC today u es Coma o recruit engineering vemment. , . x mittee, WentS. nformati the natiol nmunityo yCourtney Walker he Battalion nior wildj id she ’ her love d the th die J'C: ir- Engineering students have tie opportunity to meet re- raiters from national companies ad show off their resumes dur- Engineering Career Fair . oday and Thursday. VedMimi Onmnardoc! „nll oo hat 1 con) nany of “ wants sti myone cs ople areer Fair offers opportunities for students Companies will set up booths lild f“^ e seconc ^ floor °f the MSC l , * l vliere students can submit re- 80 ne * omes, talk with company re- ruiters and find information * itout the companies they are in- erested in. Booths will be set up from 9 m. until 4 p.m. today and 9 until 3:30 p.m. Thursday. Freshmen engineering stu- tvirownei | en ts can stop by the MSC during V Thomu would j eek sues, the; the actio: vorld. a “Making the most of Aggieland” program today from 2 p.m. until 4 p.m. This program allows the stu dents to talk with recruiters and find out what courses and grades they need to in order to land a job after graduation. Companies from Texas, Washington and California will be looking for students interest ed in co-op work, internships and full-time jobs. Mike Burck, a senior indus trial engineering major, said the fair is a great opportunity whether students want an in ternship, full-time job or want to meet people in their intended career fields. Tonight, recruiters and se lected students can enjoy “Beer, Bones and Bingo” at the Texas Hall of Fame on FM 2818. There will be $1,000 to $2,000 in door prizes. Recruiters will pass out tick ets for the event today as stu dents present their resumes. Jon Collins, a co-chair for the Engineering Career Fair and a se nior civil engineering major, said the keys to success when meeting recruiters are to act natural and try to make an impression. “Know a little about the com pany and make yourself stick in their minds, so in a couple of apitalizing On ^Engineering o pportunities months, they will remember you,” Collins said. “Find some one to actually talk to, because if they say, T can talk to this per son,’ then they will say, T can work with this person.’” Lynn Stall, manager of re cruiting for Andersen Consulting in Houston, said students need to be prepared, have resumes ready to hand out and know what they are looking for in a company. Collins said the fair is a great opportunity for everyone, and sometimes it changes the firms’ perception of what engineering students are like and what com panies are looking for in prospec tive employees. “Sometimes they come into the fair with the mentality that they want a person with a 3.5 grade point average, but come and see students with average grades who excel in other areas such as extracurricular involve ment,” he said. Stall said the fair benefits both the companies and the students. “This is a great opportunity to meet students and for the stu dents to visit with us,” Stall said. “It is a win-win situation.” Negative phone company ads may repel customers he mudslinging between MCI * ndAT&T may cause customers osign up with Sprint. - ee idbook fmc WASHINGTON (AP) — The multimil- dollar mudslinging contest the phone jmpanies are waging on TV is “really an- oying ... a turnoff,” complains Mark Jaf- ie, an AT&T customer in Meriden, Conn, jd he’s hardly alone. Though the long-distance companies say lie ads work, TV viewers and experts sug- they do more to repel customers than ■act them. The ads are biting and direct: -In one MCI ad, former game show an- f mcer Don Pardo is host of the “AT&T iue-False Quiz.” Pardo asks whether Wry AT&T customer gets true savings.” A mzzergoes off. “False,” he says. “Forty mil- ionsave nothing.” In another ad, AT&T attacks MCI’s dis- diinted calling circles in which “MCI asks [tuforthe names and numbers of your fami- hnd friends so they can solicit them to nitch to MCI. ... At AT&T, we don’t ask you fenames and numbers. ... Privacy, that’s irtrue choice, AT&T.” AT&T and MCI blame each other for the jfof negative ads, which, they say, account ideas than 20 percent of all their advertising. “We’re going to answer AT&T whenever it comes into the market and bashes MCI,” said MCI’s advertising director William Pate. AT&T, MCI and Sprint combined spend $1.2 billion a year on advertising. Nearly 19 million people switched long distance companies last year. And both AT&T and MCI, the main users of negative ads, contend they are effective in acquiring and retaining customers. "We're going to answer AT&T whenever it comes into the market and bashes MCI." — William Pate advertising director, MCI Dan Clark, an AT&T vice president, noted that his company’s ad attacking MCI’s call ing circles emphasized privacy. Professor David Stewart, chairman of the University of Southern California’s market ing department, said, “We don’t have a lot of evidence that these ads have been particu larly effective in getting people to switch from one carrier to another.” In using the negative ads, AT&T and MCI run the risk of confusing and annoying people, losing credibility and smearing themselves as well as their rival, the experts suggested. “The companies must believe their message is working, but in my mind they are canceling each other out and confusing the public,” said Joseph Turow, a communications professor at the Annenberg School for Communications at the University of Pennsylvania. In one MCI ad, an operator peeks out from behind a computer and asks: “Are you out there, AT&T? ... You’re not going to like this.” She then says that MCI, responding to an AT&T accusation that MCI doesn’t tell cus tomers the truth about savings, will provide customers with a written statement. “I hate to say it, AT&T, but you asked for it,” she says. With such ads, Thorson said, “studies have found that companies can damage their own reputations at the same time they are trying to diminish their rivals’.” Another unintended consequence of the negative campaign between AT&T and MCI is that it may help Sprint. Wally Meyer, a Sprint vice president, says that’s just what has happened, with thou sands of customers signing up because of the AT&T-MCI ad war. According to figures supplied by the Fed eral Communications Commission, for the first quarter of 1995, AT&T accounted for 56.6 percent of the long-distance market, MCI 17.7 percent, Sprint 8.7 percent and others 17 percent. 30 DAYS with purchase of any unlimited session, new members only • NO MEMBERSHIP FEE •NO CONTRACTS • Morning, Afternoon and Evening Classes • Jr. Jazzercise Classes (5-12 yrs. old) • Child Care Available For more information call Cathy! Jazzercise Fitness Center College Station Wellborn at Grove (1 block south of George Bush Dr.) 764-1183 or 776-6696 Serving B/CS since 1979 HP48G/GX Wednesday, August 30 5:30-7:00 P.M. 102 Blocker for beginners and wannabe experts Wednesday, September 6 5:30-7:00 P.M. 102 Blocker for intermediate and advanced users VOTE !!! VOTE !!! VOTE!!! For Your Department's Representative to the Graduate Student Council Why Vote? V To have a choice on graduate student issues like health benefits, tuition, student fees and acadmics V Because it directly affects you !! Elections will be held September 4-8th in your department. Contact your department for specific election sites and time. Your Vote Counts! id I in Democrats lose seventh mator to retirement ipany ity nic ed, on- io- Sen. Sam Nunn ecides not to run for •election, the GOP ould hold 60 seats. WASHINGTON (AP) — Sev- i Democrats have now decided stime to leave the Senate, ike Rhode Island’s Claiborne fill, who announced retirement fans Tuesday, most are in their feand 70s with long service be- find them. The generational turnover mid not come at a worse time for nority Democrats. Their ices of retaking control of the mate are nearly nil; they’ll be ard-pressed even to keep enough lats to sustain a filibuster. Republicans have their share • elderly senators up for re lection in 1996 - among them 2-year-old Strom Thurmond of outh Carolina. But no large- tale exodus is expected. The 594 GOP takeover elevated se- ior Republicans to coveted tadership posts that they are tath to leave. With the decision by Pell, who j ?6 and in his sixth term, Sen. am Nunn, D-Ga., is the only democrat whose intentions are ^declared. Nunn wielded major influence % defense policy when Democ- controlled Congress and he chairman of the Armed Ser- Committee. Hinsley predict- ^Nunn would pass up a re-elec tion race “because the Democratic prospects of retaking the Senate are going down the tubes.” Fifteen of the Democrats’ 46 Senate seats are up next year. A Nunn retirement would put more than half of them in the open-seat column, robbing De mocrats of the incumbent advan tage and giving the GOP fair odds to reach 60 — the number needed to shut off debate and proceed with action on a bill. All told, it’s been a demoraliz ing year for Democrats. Two sen ators and three House members have defected to the GOP since the last election. So have 107 lo cal and state officials, according to an Aug. 21 dispatch from the Republican National Committee. Pell’s retirement is not a de parture from politics but “a passing of the torch to the next generation of Democrats,” said Sen. Bob Kerrey, D-Neb., chair man of the Democratic Senatori al Campaign Committee. Republicans, however, see more than a generational hand- off in the Democrats’ misfor tunes. “The Democrats have be come a hollow party lacking fresh ideas, solutions and a vi sion for the country shared by the American people,” the RNC said in a recent memo. Nunn, who will be 57 on Sat urday, has already served four terms. He has said now would be the time to enter the private sec tor if he wants to pursue a sec ond career. INDICATIONS: For the temporary relief of minor aches and pains associated with (tie common cold, headache, toothache, mus cular aches, backache, for the minor pain of arthritis, for the pain of menstrual cramps, and for reduction of fever. 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