The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current, February 19, 1996, Image 1

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WILD WEEKEND
The A&M Baseball Team gets a
sweep, a no-hitter and a record.
Sports, Page 7
LAPSE OF REASON
Pace: Education at A&M focuses on memorization
rather than true reasoning skills.
Opinion, Page 11
SUPER SANDLER
Adam Sandler's comedic talents
make Happy Gilmore a winner.
Aggielife, Page 3
.The Battalion
l. 102, No. 95 (12 pages)
Serving Texas A&M University Since 1893
Monday • February 19, 1996
na-
i
andidates to inform
oters before elections
iEach candidate for Brazos County
ffices will receive equal time at
onight's political forum.
y Michelle Lyons
he Battalion
Members of the Bryan-College Station com-
lunity will have the opportunity to “Meet the
andidates” for all Brazos County primary races
anight at 7 p.m. on KAMU-TV Channel 15 and
[AMU-FM 90.9.
KAMU “Meet the Candidates” will be a live
lolitical forum to inform voters about who is
unning for political office and what their plat-
orms and qualifications are.
The event, which is co-sponsored by the Bra-
os Valley chapter of the League of Women Vot-
irs, will be mediated by Dr. Sharon Colson, exec-
itive producer and host of KAMU-TV’s weekly
irogram, 15 Magazine.
Janelle Paulsen, a KAMU-TV promotions em-
iloyee and a senior agricultural journalism major,
laid the broadcast will not be a debate, but rather a
lolitical forum for informational purposes only.
“It’s not a debate,” Paulsen said. “It’s just a forum
ivhere (candidates) can tell voters what they stand
brand what they believe in.”
Paulsen said voters need to know the inten-
ions of the candidates who are running for Bra
zos County offices.
“We are a part of this community,” she said, “and
these are the people that run it. It’s important for us
to know who they are and what goals they have.
Voters need to be informed if they are going to make
a wise choice.”
Naomi Fackler, co-president of the Brazos Valley
chapter of the League of Women Voters, said it is
important for voters to be fully informed.
“One of our main goals is to give our voters as
much information as we can about the candidates so
they can make intelligent decisions,” Fackler said.
“(The forums) are very informative.”
An equal amount of time is allocated to each can
didate, but they are not required to answer a set
number of questions.
Colson said the candidates appreciate the air
time and the opportunity to reach voters.
“Try as they may, they can’t ring every doorbell
in the area,” she said. “This does give them the op
portunity to reach many people.”
The forum will be rebroadcast Wednesday, Feb.
21 and Friday, Feb. 23 at 11 a.m., and on Thursday,
Feb. 22 at 7 p.m.
Toby Boenig, student body president and a senior
agricultural development major, said students who
plan to vote in the county elections should pay atten
tion to the forum.
“I think that for the people voting in county elec
tions, it’s probably a very good idea that they tune in
to this,” Boenig said.
Paulsen said that though A&M boasts a high
percentage of voters in campus elections, stu
dents constitute a low percentage of voters in
county elections.
Increasing the Peace
□People interested in
service with the Peace
Corps should begin the
application process
nine to 12 months
prior to the date they
would like to leave the
United States.
By Heather Pace
The Battalion
For those who dream of
blazing their own trails, the
Peace Corps offers opportuni
ties to make a difference in the
lives of people in more than 90
countries around the world.
To date, 344 A&M gradu
ates have served in the Peace
Corps.
Lacy Vaccaro, a class of ’95
sociology graduate, will join
the ranks of the 42 A&M stu
dents now serv
ing as
Peace
Corps
The mission of Peace Corps is to promote world peace.
The three goals:
To help the people of interested countries and areas in
meeting their need for trained men and women
To help promote a better understanding of Ameriarut
on the part of the peoples served.
To help promote a better understanding of other
peoples on the part of Americans.
Currently, there are 42 A&M graduates serving in 27
different countries.
Over 344 Aggies who have served as Peace Corps
volunteers.
volunteers in 27 countries.
Next month, she will begin
twelve weeks of training be
fore leaving for Paraguay,
where she will work with at-
risk children.
“It was always something I
wanted to do,” Vaccaro said. “I
thought this would be a good
chance to do service work
hands-on instead of something
you just do on the weekends.”
Vaccaro said that although
she is not being sent to her
first-choice country, she was
able to specify the continent on
which she wanted to work.
“I didn’t really have a
choice,” she said, “but since I
had some Spanish background
and wanted to come back flu
ent in Spanish, they decided to
send me to Paraguay.”
There, Vaccaro will be im
plementing programs to give
youth direction and hope for
the future.
Peace Corps volunteers of
ten return to the United States
with new perspectives.
Nichola Minott, an early
childhood education consultant
in Paraguay, said she came
back with a revised sense of
what is important in life.
“I think in the United States
people tend to focus on con
suming and having things,”
Minott said. “But I think in
Paraguay people are more con
cerned with living and not
putting so much emphasis on
See Peace Corps, Rage 6
SCONA faces future issues
□ Students participated
in small-group
roundtable discussions,
generating solutions to
difficult governmental
problems.
By Kendra S. Rasmussen
The Battalion
Delegates to the 41st annual
MSC Student Conference on Na
tional Affairs held at Texas
A&M this weekend overlooked
their political affiliations in or
der to suggest solutions to diffi
cult governmental problems.
Tim Fricke, an A&M delegate
and senior political science ma
jor, said governmental processes
are often hindered by the ani
mosity Democrats and Republi
cans display toward one another.
“Just because one person uses
the title Democrat and one uses
the title Republican doesn’t
mean they should automatically
disagree,” Fricke said.
The students at the SCONA
conference were able to avoid
fixation on party affiliations, he
said, while working together on
roundtable topics.
Diane Maddox, SCONA exec
utive committee chairwoman
and a senior kinesiology major,
said delegates from A&M and 14
other universities were divided
into groups of 10 to 15 people for
nine roundtable discussions
about issues that will face the
government in the 21st century.
“We wanted the delegates to
answer the question of how they
would like to see their country
run in the future,” Maddox said.
The delegates were not the
only SCONA participants down
playing the importance of politi
cal party affiliations.
See SCONA, Page 6
Rony Angkriwan, The Battalion
PRACTICE MAKES PERFECT
Children of A&M professors and students practice backstage for their performance at the Chinese
New Year celebration in Rudder Theatre Sunday evening.
Greek Week gives sneak peek
□ A date auction and a
mixer at the Texas Hall
of Fame are among the
activities scheduled for
this week.
By Marissa Alanis
The Battalion
Texas A&M’s Greek Week will
bring fraternities, sororities and
other student body members to
gether to participate in a variety
of social and charitable events.
Tom Hegi, a junior accounting
major and Greek Week co-chair,
said this year’s Greek Week
theme, “United in Tradition,”
emphasizes that the events are
open for everybody to enjoy.
“It’s not to celebrate us,”
Hegi said. “We want everybody
to socialize. It’s just not a
Greek thing.”
Coordinated by the Greek
honor society Order of Omega,
Greek Week will consist of fund
raising events, such as a date
auction and a barbecue picnic at
the Grove on Tuesday.
Date packages created by
each chapter will be bid on at
the Grab-A-Greek Auction Fri
day at 7 p.m. in Rudder Theatre.
Michelle Fuller, a sophomore
accounting major and Grab-A-
Greek Auction chair, said there
is a $50 spending limit and
dates must stay within the
Bryan-College Station area.
Fuller said restrictions were
imposed this year because of an
incident at last year’s auction in
which a man took the sorority
member he bid on to Las Vegas.
“We want to keep it from get
ting real extravagant,” Fuller
said. “We don’t want some chap
ters spending like $250 when
others can’t.”
Fuller said the list of pro
posed date packages turned in
by the chapters range from
horseback riding to an airplane
ride over Bryan-College Station.
Tuesday night, Order of
Omega will join with other cam
pus organizations to present
“Friendship in the Age of AIDS,”
a program about coping with
friends who have HIV. Schlem-
mer said the presentation will be
educational for those who attend.
“It’s a pertinent topic for col
lege students, since we think
we’re invincible and we’re not,”
Schlemmer said. “It’s a reality
check.”
In appreciation of University
faculty, each Greek chapter se
lected two faculty members to
attend a breakfast in the Koldus
Building Governance Room
Wednesday at 8 a.m.
Wednesday night, two repre
sentatives from each chapter will
bring a child from the Brazos
County Boys and Girls Club to
the A&M men’s basketball game.
Half of the proceeds from an
All-University Mixer that will be
held Thursday night at the
See Greeks, Page 6
Children play at E-Day
Gwendolyn Struve, The Battalion
Jim Pinkerton, author of "What
Comes Next: The End of Big
Government and the New Para
digm Ahead," speaks at the
SCONA conference Saturday on
"Replacing the Bureaucratic Op
erating System."
□ The science fair was the first
event of Engineers Week, which will
be celebrated with daily campus
events until Saturday.
By Danielle Pontiff
The Battalion
The Texas A&M Student Engineering Council
hosted its fourth annual Engineering Day at Post
Oak Mall Saturday, giving children a chance to
learn about physics, chemistry and engineering in
a nonclassroom atmosphere.
The event launched A&M’s Engineers Week,
which begins today and concludes Saturday.
Eric Baggerman, a junior chemical engineering
major and E-Day at the Mall committee chairman,
said exhibits from A&M’s scientific departments
provided children with hands-on science experi
ence, not just material from a textbook.
“The exhibits are an effort to spread engineering
and science to young kids,” Baggerman said. “They
are set up in a way so that children can have a bet
ter understanding of science and also have fun.”
One exhibit, sponsored by the Biomedical Engi
neering Society, set up a laser to demonstrate its
use in surgery and cancer treatments.
Stewart Robinson, a biomedical engineering
graduate student, said children were interested in
how lasers work to heal the body.
“One lady brought her sons to this exhibit to see
the laser,” Robinson said. “She had just had laser
surgery on her gall bladder two weeks ago. She
was able to explain to her sons that this is what
happened to her in surgery.”
The physics department set up a gyroscope exhib
it that demonstrated a principle called conservation
See Engineers, Page 12
Amy Browning, The Battalion
Ray McKinney, a senior chemistry major, demon
strates the unusual properties of cornstarch putty.