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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Oct. 23, 1995)
f /s -The Da;, 'sday si^. nsive k Q d releas- e Barnei roster, of M 'as with ikins ,r spend: i the sed him Meloncholy Blind Melon's lead singer, Shannon Hoon, died Saturday in New Orleans. Aggielife, Page 3 Going out in style! Back In Business Stidvent: There are some products on which the A&M seal does not belong. Opinion, Page 9 The Aggie Football Team rebounds with a 24-9 win over Baylor. Sports, Page 7 Battalio ’•pound ts original ound dra! s. ind Prair; a the offs;- t. ear ity of (I first sett ■ boys ro® arily ■16 brcingtt jffensive nbles wt.- Jamie Wa; ig up Vol. 102, No. 41 (10 pages) Established in 1893 Monday • October 23, 1995 Senate group offers three cultures alternatives □ The suggestions were discussed during an Academic Affairs committee meeting Sunday night. By Lori Young The Battalion The Student Senate Academic Affairs committee presented three new alternatives for a cultures re quirement last night. Jesse Czelusta, an on-cam pus Northside senator and a se nior agricultural economics ma jor, presented the first alterna tive, which would call for each respective college to create its own cultures requirement. Bo Armstrong, an off-cam- pus senator and a junior com puter science major, said the majority of students supported allowing individual colleges to set a requirement. “We think its very important that those who are experts in your field set the curriculum,” Armstrong said. Jason Waligura, a College of Engineering senator and a junior petroleum engineering major, said this alternative would best prepare students because it en hances each student’s degree. “It preserves the student’s freedom,” Waligura said. “We didn’t want someone from the College of Liberal Arts setting the curriculum for someone in engineering.” Waligura also said the flexibili ty provided by this proposal would decrease the negative feel ings about a cultures requirement among students and faculty. The second alternative, pre sented by Off-campus Senator Chris Miller, would support the original Faculty Senate propos al and the existing qualifying course list. The Faculty Senate bill, pro posed in 1993, mandates six cred it hours of cultures courses — three hours concerning U.S. cul tures and three hours concerning international cultures. The Faculty Senate bill would also provide a list of more than 200 courses that would fulfill the requirements. Elizabeth Neugart, an off-cam pus senator and a junior biomed ical sciences major, said the Stu dent Senate needs to re-examine its role on the issue. “We are a Board of Trustees in this situation,” Neugart said. Miller, a sophomore English major, said the Faculty Senate has done much research on the is sue of multiculturalism, and to be effective, both the Student and Faculty Senates need to speak with one voice. “We want to make sure the students get an effective educa tion out of this,” he said. The third alternative, present ed by Off-campus Senator Jason Herrick, proposes that the state- mandated History 105 and 106 and Political Science 205 and 206 qualify as fulfilling a three-hour American cultures requirement. Herrick’s proposal would also call for a three-hour, University wide international requirement with the specific qualifying class lists to be developed by the indi vidual colleges. Waligura advised the senators to talk to all their constituents and not focus on a few highly vo cal students. “This is a very emotional is sue,” he said. “There seems to be a couple of minority groups that have made this their war cry.” These three alternatives will be debated at the next Relations and Curriculum subcommittee meeting Sunday, Oct. 29 at 9 p.m. in 146 Koldus. Czelusta stressed that the Stu dent Senate members need the opinions of their constituents. “We are open to any ideas you have,” he said. nd by ball ng a 42-1! ie coach® ipponent, spread I y-thin Bet beginnini me obvioti shot at tin responds .g the fe jo for it. :overing i and scoriil th quarts ard scons hed 100 3 points. rity ie door Nick Rodnicki, The Battalion Ready for take-off Michael Yoder, age 13, readies at the Lake Bryan Mountain Bike Challenge starting line. Yoder participated in the beginner class, placing fourth. The race was held Saturday at Bryan Utility Lake. Lecture series addresses violence against women □ Investigating men before dating them is one way to prevent domestic violence. By Kristen Homyk The Battalion Women in Science and Engineering continued their Women's Health Month lecture series Friday with “His torical and Sociological Perspectives on Domestic Violence.” Mitzi Vorachek, director of Com munity Education for the Houston Area Women’s Center, discussed the cycle of violence against women, the ways in which it is perpetuated and the best preventions and cures for domestic violence. Domestic violence is defined as in tentional, repeated acts by an individu al’s intimate partner that cause physi cal, sexual, emotional, economic or spir itual harm to the individual, usually in a predictive cycle. FBI statistics say one of two women will be in a relationship with a batterer in her lifetime. “A small minority of men batter, but what happens is they go from woman to woman,” Vorachek said. The cycle of violence is harder on middle- and upper-class women, who See Violence, Page 6 Shane Elkins, Tin Battalion Mitzi Vorachek, director of Communi ty Education for the Houston Area Women's Center, spoke about domes tic violence Friday. Baker’s parents testify in trial □ Store employees said Shamburger used stolen credit cards to make purchases the month of the murder. By Lily Aguilar The Bati align The parents of Lori Ann Baker testi fied Friday that their daughter’s murder had destroyed their lives, and other wit nesses told jurors that convicted mur derer Ron Shamburger used credit cards taken from Baker’s apartment to pur chase luxury items. Shamburger was convicted of capital murder last Thursday and faces a life sentence or the death penalty. Brazos County District Attorney Bill Turner called Baker’s parents to the stand to testify about their daughter’s character and the impact her death had on their lives. Faye Baker, the victim’s mother, said she and her daughter did “girls things together” and described the 20-year-old woman as her “best friend.” “We were extremely close,” Faye Bak er said. “She was my best friend. She was my life, really.” The murder of her daughter has dramatically changed her life, Faye Baker said. “I am so depressed I don’t go out,” she said. “I stay in the house most of the time. I just don’t feel well.” The victim’s father, Derrel Baker, was in Aberdeen, Scotland, when his wife called him about their daughter’s murder. Derrel Baker said he was totally shocked by the news. “I just dropped the phone and said, ‘No! No! This can’t be true,”’ he said. Derrel Baker described his daughter as “absolutely the sweetest girl in the world,” and said his daughter’s death has wrecked his life. “I can’t think of anything that can hap pen to a father worse than this,” he said. Turner also called on several local youths who knew Shamburger to testify about the defendant. Lindsay Wilson,17, worked with Shamburger at the Albertson’s grocery store on Longmire Drive. Wilson said Shamburger often talked to her. Wilson said Shamburger knew her address, license plate number and other important pieces of information about her. She said she never told him any of the information. “He knew everything about me,” she said. Prosecutors also called on Dr. Elise Garrison, an A&M associate professor of modern languages, who told the court that $80 in cash and two gold credit cards were taken from her house on Sept. 20, 1994, 10 days before Bak er’s murder. Witnesses from local stores testified, saying Shamburger had used credit cards he had stolen from Baker and her neighbors, including Garrison, at their stores in August and September 1994. Employees from Dillards, FYo Golf Dis count of Aggieland and Cavender’s Boot City said they recognized the defendant as the man who came into their stores and purchased goods with Baker’s card. They said Shamburger used the credit cards to buy more than $1,200 of shoes, clothing and other luxury items, such as cigars and alcohol. Proceedings resume today at 8:30 a.m. Breaking barriers History prof part □ Unterberger first came to campus in 1968. She is the winner of three distinguished teaching awards. By Heather Pace The Battaeion Dr. Betty Unterberger, the first female full professor appointed at Texas A&M, has provided a role model for women and expanded the international scope of the histo ry department during her years at A&M. Unterberger first came to A&M in 1968 because she and her husband, a geophysics professor, were both of fered jobs. “It took a certain amount of vision from the University to bring me here because it was a predominantly male in stitution,” Unterberger said. “At the time, Gen. (Earl) Rudder was president, and he had the vision to ultimately open the door for women.” The winner of three distinguished teaching awards and author of two prize-winning books, Unterberger said women scholars need more recognition for the many and often unpublicized contributions they make to the acade mic community. Unterberger attended Syracuse University for her un dergraduate degree, Harvard University for her master’s, and Duke University for her Ph.D. She specializes in in ternational history and American foreign relations, espe cially between the U.S.S.R and the Far East. Earning a double major in political science and history, Unterberger decided to concentrate in history because she believes the past is the key to the present. “I believe that in order to understand the present, you have to have a solid understanding of the past, which in cludes a history of all peoples and cultures,” she said. Unterberger’s job has taken her all over the world, teaching and lecturing in such varied places as Peking University in Beijing, Charles University in Prague, Czechoslovakia, Turkey and Pakistan. As the first female professor at A&M, Unterberger has broken through many barriers. “In the beginning years, men couldn’t fathom what a woman was doing in their classes,” she said. “When I walked into class, they thought I was a secretary telling of A&M history them that their professor couldn’t be there.” Although she said the women began attending A&M “very, very slowly,” Unterberger said she was excited as the number of women enrolled in the University began to grow. Unterberger said she can relate to the difficulty of women who were integrated into A&M because she is in a field dominated by men. “I feel like I’ve done a great deal for women students because it v^ps pretty intimidating coming into predomi nantly male classes, many of them in uniform,” she said. Unterberger said her understanding of how to deal with barriers has grown over the years in. “One of the ways in which I have developed is learning how to bring about change without aggressive confronta tion,” she said. Dr. Julia Blackwelder, the head of the history depart ment, has seen the creativity and ingenuity that Unter berger instills in her students. See Unterberger, Page 5 Shane Elkins, The Battalion History professor Dr. Betty Unterberger specializes in in ternational history and American foreign relations.