The Battalion
oard of Regents elects new chair
I
committee approved
in on-campus child-care
center at yesterday's
\neeting.
By Melissa Nunnery
The Battalion
|Don Powell hopes to provide lead-
Jhip as the newly elected chairman
■the Texas A&M University System
jjard of Regents.
Part folk in a series of folk
|The election of a new chairman
s the first order of business at yes
terday’s Board meeting. Regent T.
Michael O’Connor was chosen to
serve as vice chairman of the Board.
“I’m humbled,” Powell said. “The cur
rent regents are exceptional people who
have unparalleled ability and service at
titudes. I am honored and thrilled to
work with these people.”
Powell, whose term as regent ends
in 2001, said each member of the
Board is equally important and that
he plans to learn from their high stan
dards and priorities.
“[The chairman’s job is to] make
sure each and every member receives
respect from each of us and [to make
sure] their voice and thoughts are ex
pressed freely without any constraint
[and] with all the integrity we can
muster,” he said.
In other business, the facilities plan
ning and building committee approved
the next phase in the building of the
proposed on-campus child-care center
at Texas A&M. The University would
provide about $1 million in start-up
funds for the center, which would then
be self-sufficient.
The proposal, which was sent to
committee for consideration at the re
gents’ January meeting, met with op
position from Regent Guadalupe
Rangel. She said the center’s proposed
tuition, probable long waiting list and
$10 waiting list fee would be cause for
frustration in the long run.
“ [It is] too much of an investment to
benefit too few people,” Rangel said.
She suggested the center be priva
tized so the University’s money could
be used for scholarships.
A&M President Ray Bowen said
private funds currently are not avail
able for the center.
“[We are] weighing a lot of differ
ent competing priorities,” Bowen
said. “[This] use of this money is the
highest need at this time.”
Regent Erie Nye said the center
would alleviate frustration, despite the
fact that there would be too few spaces
available to fulfill the demand for the
center’s services.
“Some effort to meet some of the
demand would produce less frustra
tion,” Nye said.
Bowen commented on the high de
mand for the center.
See Regents, Page 6
Robert McKay, The Battalion
Don Powell, newly elected chairman of the Texas A&M
University System Board of Regents, is congratulated by Re
gent T. Michael O'Connor, who was chosen to serve as
vice chairman of the Board.
|Pa(j;
126, |
Beat It
Robert McKay, The Battalion
Steve McFadden, a percussionist with the Christian rock
band Legacy, plays outside the MSC Wednesday afternoon as
part of the Resurrection Week festivities.
Lecture to focus on improving
communication between races
By Benjamin Cheng
The Battalion
Communication between races will be
discussed when Dr. Orlando Taylor visits
Texas A&M today from 12 to 1 p.m. in room
229 of the Memorial Student Center.
Taylor’s lecture is titled “Race, Com
munication and Diversity: Challenges
and Opportunity for the Academy.” Tay
lor studies intercultural communication
at Howard University and is president
elect of the National Speech Communi
cation Association.
Dr. Martin Medhurst, associate head of
the Department of Speech Communica
tions, said Taylor will discuss how mis-
communication can arise among people
from different races and how better com
munication can foster better relationships.
Medhurst said people need to under
stand and appreciate better the views of
people of different races.
“It’s a question of how we become one na
tion from multiple voices,” Medhurst said.
Anissa Silva, a senior sociology major,
said people typically see those of different
races in a stereotypical manner.
“Once you communicate, the stereo
types dissolve,” Silva said. “It’s not what you
are, it’s what you do.”
Kevin Carruthers, the director of multicul
tural services at A&M, said interracial com
munication at A&M needs improvement. He
said African-American students at A&M have
informed him they have been told in a hostile
manner to remove their hats in the MSC.
“It (what he hears from students) tells
me that we still have work to do in this
area,” Carruthers said.
People should seek to educate them
selves about issues and improve their
communication skills, he said.
“People need to talk about fact, not fic
tion,” Carruthers said.
Sarah Wilson, a senior speech commu
nications major, said she does not see a
major problem with interracial communi
cation at A&M.
“We all address each other as A&M stu
dents,” Wilson said. “We’re Aggies first.”
Silva said the Hopwood decision has
strained interracial relations and hurt mi
nority recruitment at A&M.
“We need to encourage minorities to go
to college to improve interracial commu
nications,” she said.
Medhurst said Taylor’s lecture provides
an opportunity to address some of these
racial issues on campus.
“It’s the kind of topic we need to be talk
ing about at A&M,” he said.
Taylor is the Dean of Howard Universi
ty’s Graduate School of Arts and Sciences
and a professor in communications. His
lecture is sponsored by the A&M Depart
ment of Speech Communications and the
Office of the Vice President for Research
and Graduate Studies.
Spiritual leader to receive award
A&M professor will attend ceremony at Westminster Abbey
By Graham Harvey
The Battalion
In 1972, global investor Sir John Marks
Templeton founded the Templeton Prize
for Progress in Religion, an award given an
nually to a living person who has innova-
tively contributed to mankind’s awareness
of God or spirituality.
This year the award will be presented to
Pandurang Shastri Athavale of India.
Dr. Betty M. Unterberger, the Patricia
and Bookman Peters professor of history at
A&M, nominated Athavale for the prize
and plans to be present when he receives
it. Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, will
present Athavale with the prize on May 6 at
Westminster Abbey in London.
Donald Lehr, public relations represen
tative for the New York-based Templeton
Foundation, said the award is substantial.
“The Templeton Prize, valued at
750,000 pounds sterling, about $1.21 mil
lion, is the world’s largest annual mone
tary award,” Lehr said.
A panel of nine judges, including former
President George Bush, selected Athavale as
this year’s Templeton Prize winner, Lehr said.
Unterberger, an expert in Asian stud
ies, was one of the first Western scholars
to recognize a global importance in
Athavale’s spiritual philosophy of life,
called Swadhyaya, a Sanskrit word
meaning “self-study.”
One of the West’s foremost authorities
on the movement, Unterberger owns one
of the the largest private collections of re
search materials relating to Swadhyaya, all
gained from her trips to India and her
many interviews with Athavale.
For three years she has nominated
Athavale, also called the Dada, meaning
“elder brother,” for the Templeton Prize,
and she now is requesting a grant to write
a history of Swadhyaya and its creator.
“Swadhyaya is not a denomination in any
sense of the word,” Unterberger said.
‘Athavale wants us to have deep love and re
spect for all the major religions of the world.”
The philosophy teaches love for others
and trust in God are the answers to all
questions, Unterberger said. Athavale
teaches that people must rely on them
selves rather than blaming the world for
their problems.
See Award, Page 6
ollege of Liberal Arts approves cultural studies minor
|Dr. Richard K. Curry
has been named
coordina tor of the
new minor.
By Rebecca Torrellas
The Battalion
i The College of Liberal Arts
PBs developed a Comparative
and Cultural Studies minor at
Texas A&M for students inter
ested in continuing study of di
verse cultures.
The college’s Curriculum
Committee has approved a
menu of courses from which stu
dents may choose to build a tai
lored minor.
Dr. Woodrow Jones, Jr., dean
of the College of Liberal Arts,
said companies are looking for
graduates with a mature per
spective on globalization and
cultural diversity.
“The Comparative Cultural Stud
ies minor is designed for those stu
dents who are interested in broad
ening their national or international
perspectives,” Jones said.
Dr. Richard K. Curry, associate
professor of Spanish, has been
named the first coordinator of the
new minor.
Curry came to Texas A&M in
1987 with a Ph.D. in Spanish from
Arizona State University.
Jones said Curry was the ide
al candidate for the position be
cause of his extensive experi
ence advising and coordinating
language learning in the De
partment of Modern and Clas
sical Languages.
“His background in Hispanic
culture and literature gives him a
strong cross-cultural communi
cations knowledge,” Jones said.
“This knowledge will be pivotal in
the development of this minor.”
Curry said the course require
ments for the Comparative Cul
tural Studies minor depend on
student interest.
“I think this minor will be in
valuable to those students who
are looking for a way to consol
idate their interests in other
cultures into a field of study,”
Curry said.
The Comparative Cultural
Studies minor requires a three-
hour foundation course, a
three-hour capstone course,
and four three-hour courses
from any one topical or geo
graphical area.
Students’ choices include
African‘-American, African, Asian,
Central and South American,
Latino, and Eastern and Western
European Culture.
The Comparative Cultural
Studies minor will be available in
the fall of 1997.
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AP
RANCHO SANTA FE, Calif. (AP) — The bodies of
at least 39 young men, lying side by side in match
ing dark pants and tennis shoes, were found scat
tered throughout a million-dollar mansion Wednes
day in an apparent mass suicide.
The men, all white and between the ages of 18
and 24, were lying prone with their hands at their
sides. There were no sign of survivors, said San Diego
County Sheriff’s Cmdr. Alan Fulmer.
TWo deputies searched the palatial home about 3:15
p.m. after an anonymous caller told them to “check on
the welfare of the residents.” A deputy entered the home
through a side door and quickly saw 10 bodies.
Then, he and another deputy made a cursory search
of the mansion, counting 39 bodies clustered in vari
ous rooms, all of all of them lying on their back and “ap
pearing as if they had fallen asleep,” Fulmer said.
The two deputies then left, and no one else had
reentered the home as ofWednesday night. Author
ities were waiting for a search warrant before pro
ceeding further.
Investigators believe it’s a mass suicide “due to the
number people involved, no signs of struggle, no
signs of trauma,” sheriff’s Lt. Gerald Lipscomb said.
The cause of death has not been determined, he
said. There was a pungent odor, and the two
deputies were sent to the hospital for blood tests.
KNBC-TV reported that a real estate agent
said the home had been on the market for quite
some time and that they were having trouble
selling it. The agent complained that every time
they tried to show the house, a religious cult was
having a meeting there.
There was no indication whether the deaths were
related to Saturday’s fiery mass suicide in Quebec of
five members of the Order of the Solar Temple, a
doomsday cult that believes suicide transports them
to a new life on a planet called Sirius.
The Battalion
INSIDETODAY
—
PAINTBALUN':When
these folks want to
shoot someone, they
grab a ‘marker,’ take
aim and let the paint-
balls fly.
Aggielife, Page 3
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Opinion
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