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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Feb. 10, 1998)
Februa: iuiz.pi dical cl ndardsh same foil aup doe: then mi- aid Texas A & M University ‘ mm m JM' '9 L 1 *11 TODAY 65 45 TOMORROW iiMNMfe wKKm pt*,™ YEAR • ISSUE 87 * 12 PACES became er thef: he prop-, at let niversiti Iniversir .'M Unit COLLEGE STATION • TX TUESDAY • FEBRUARY 10 • 1998 ee recommendations announced 1 By Rachel Dawley Stajf writer e Student Senate and Graduate Stu- 3ouncil next week will consider a rec- ,m ’‘ l 2nelat ion from the Student Semce Fee ( J I 1111 ': ition Board (SSFAB) for the allocation int ,7mi llion in student service and health r fees for 1998-99 school year, pproved, the proposal will go to the of- f the Vice President of Student Affairs idem ■ apprt crGro: lea. the he. President Dr. Ray M. Bowen. The erems, reset nation will be before the Board of its during their March meeting. t ' ,)nI e SSFAB, comprised of nine appointed '8 ^ i! nts, allocated $9.6 million in student !nt efees and $4.1 million in health center ' an " departments receiving these funds in- the Memorial Student Center, Recre- al Sports, The Battalion, the Student selin g Service, Bus Operations, Student | rnment and Multicultural Services. Ije board is appointed with direct input ifhe Student Government Association. The SSFAB recommended an increase in the Student Health Services Fee from $44 per semester to $48 per semester. The increase will be used for state mandated salary in creases, utility improvements, ambulance expenses and inflationary costs. The MSG receives the highest amount of student service fees, totaling almost two mil lion dollars, followed by the Student Coun seling Service and Recreational Sports. Heath Hendricks, SSFAB chair and a ju nior chemical engineering major, said the groups with major budgetary changes this year are The Battalion, the Child Care Center and the Aggie Band. The board recommended a decrease to half of the normal budget for The Battalion because of the size of the paper’s reserves and the large amount of mandatory salary increases around campus. The Child Care Center, which was unable to open when planned, was not allocated funds in next year’s budget because the cen ter did not use last year’s funds. The Aggie Band’s budget was almost dou bled for drill field repairs, instrument re placement and mandatory salary increases. MacGregor Stephenson, a SSFAB mem ber and a doctoral student in educational ad ministration, said increases in funding for most areas centered around mandated salary increases and computer upgrades. “The University is looking towards its goal of keeping up-to-date computer systems,” Stephenson said. “This requires that there be yearly funding of capital outlays for comput ers. This is the reason for major funding in creases in different areas.” Stephenson was recently chosen as the 1998-99 SSFAB Chair. Applications are currently being accept ed for next year’s SSFAB. Applications are available in the Student Government office and are due Friday. Stephenson said the board is looking for a diverse group of students. “We as students have an incredible op portunity to make a direct impact on the manner in which the student fees are allo cated,” Stephenson said. “We’re looking for people that have experience or interest in student activities and programming at A&M. We’re trying to ensure the board represents the student body as a whole.” Faye Little, Vice President of Finance for the Student Government Association and a senior finance major, said student members gain valuable experience by serving on the SSFAB. “The board provides great budgetary and business management experience,” Little said. “It also gives members insight into the University and the opportunity to work with administration.” Little said the SSFAB is unique because it makes recommendations based on student input. “Texas A&M is very fortunate to have the SSFAB,” Little said. “We are the only school in the Big 12 to have a board like this. It is very refreshing to know that students have this much input into where their fees go.” ft* Allocation Final Recommendation % change Memorial Student Center $ 1,923,147 6 Recreational Sports $ 1,479,068 6 Student Life $ 737,800 15 Multicultural Services $390,365 12 Student Financial Aid $ 329,281 3 Student Government $117,312 12 Aggie Band $92,428 85 Child Care Center $0 -100 rater, water everywhere Fs fort specr [rchir; ice, a:; )hvsi' lits issue- "urge:: olph fe ll Birm: [plosiori Lyons lized it fficer s kile vat tit - H • ■ mmm mm GREG MCREYNOLDS/The Battalion in T. Bellah shoots water from the monitor position at the Brayton Fire School Monday. Bellah was there his annual training for Formosa Chemical Plant. sj S I D E “ aggie life North by North- gate scheduled to host over 30 musical talents in various local music venues. See Page 3 lie Softball Team begins fcampaign today against thwest Texas. See Page 7 Lecture series illustrates planning of Bush Library opinion ions: Allowing children to >e Internet unsupervised I potential for danger. See Page 11 >:/ /battalion.tamu.edu |k up with state and na- Jal news through The s, AP’s 24-hour online % service. By Lyndsay Nantz Staff writer Students and the general public will get an insider’s view to the plan ning and design phases of the George Bush Presidential Library and Museum during the Rowlett Lecture Series today. The program consists of morn ing and afternoon sessions with speakers from Texas A&M, includ ing Don W. Wilson, executive direc tor of the Bush Library. Wilson said the program is an opportunity to understand every thing involved in the development of a building. “Our goal in the development of the George Bush Library Center has been to create a living institution,” Wilson said. “The program centers on how the library came to be and how it came to A&M.” The morning series will focus on the political side of planning the library, which occurred when Bush was still in office. The after noon will focus on the design of the library and will include a time- lapse video of the construction process. Students can attend the entire program or just the series that interest them. Bobby Bernshausen, communi cation specialist with the College of Architecture, said the program is open to everyone. “Anybody who wants to come is more than welcome and it is free of charge,” Bernshausen said. “It should be a lot of interest to con struction science majors, and any “A&M captured a ma jor prize when we got the Bush Library.” Don W. Wilson Executive Director of the Bush Library student in the College of Architec ture is excused from classes to go.” The program will be from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. at the Presidential Confer ence Center and charter busses will pick up students at the MSC and Langford Architecture Center. “A&M captured a major prize when we got the Bush Library,” Wilson said. “Everyone should go so they can see how much is involved in the planning and building of a presi dential library.” Proposed changes to ’Net may overload CIS resources By Lyndsay Nantz Staff writer What used to take Texas A&M students several minutes to do will soon take only a few seconds after Compaq, Intel and Microsoft an nounced plans last week to in crease the speed of the Internet by 30 times. The three companies joined forces with GTE Corporation to make upgraded modems that plug into normal telephone lines with out interrupting the voice line. Richard Spiller, supervisor of open access labs, said the reason there are so many delays in down loading information is because of data-heavy graphics. “Some pages have more images and graphics,” he said. “Therefore, there is more information to download and it takes longer.” The traditional method, con verting digital computer data into analog format, only reaches 53,000 bits per second. The new speed should reach 1.5 megabits per second. Spiller said images that now would take a minute or longer to view will appear in a few seconds. If such quick access to informa tion is available, new services will m be possible over the net. PCsAvill be able to shows video over the Internet that are close to televi sion quality. David Hess, network group manager for CIS, said Universal Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Lines (ADSLs) allow connecting to the Internet and calling simulta neously over one phone line. “ADSLs can send bits across the existing wire that run the phone,” he said. “But they are two different services. One is for voice and one for data.” Hess said the major concern A&M has with the ADSLs is that to support the system the Uni- j versity and homes that log on through A&M must be wired to a central office. “We don’t have the facility to run this on our own,” he said. “It is impossible for A&M to run wire throughout the entire city. Hope fully, telephone companies, specifically GTE, will get into the business and offer the system to the community soon.” Plans have been approved, and GTE will interconnect A&M and off-campus students, Hess said. In the meantime, A&M has or dered 1,100 modems to alleviate some of the busy signals students get when they try to log on. Student research program offered By Susan E. Atchison Staff writer The Office of Research and Graduate Studies at Texas A&M University will sponsor Summer Research Opportunity Programs (SROP) to offer outstanding undergraduate students the opportunity to work closely with faculty and graduate students on re search projects in all academic disciplines. The ten week program, scheduled for May 31 to August 7, 1998, is offered on a competitive basis to students entering their junior or senior college years during the 1998-99 academic year. SROP coordinator Fidel Fernandez said that work shops and activities are offered in a collaborative, university-wide effort to prepare students for gradu ate school. A seminar is planned to help prepare students to take the Graduate Records Examination, which is a major part of the process of applying to grad uate school. Students will be trained on Power Point, a software program used in professional presentations. The soft ware training is provided by the College of Engineering. Students will be taught how to construct academ ic research posters, which is another component of graduate school. Annette Hardin, assistant director in the Office of Graduate Studies, said participants enroll in classes and work one-on-one with a professor doing re search they would not necessarily have the opportu nity to do on their home campus. “[The students] establish connections with pro fessors, and maybe in the long run they will be work ing with those professors,” Hardin said. “It really helps the transition.” Participants may receive a maximum $2,500 stipend that pays for housing, tuition, meals and fees during the summer. Darlene Espinosa, a senior nutrition major, par ticipated in the 1997 research program. She said the experience encouraged her to go to graduate school, despite her previous disinterest. Espinosa said her summer was spent conducting breast cancer research. “It was good experience to be able to work with other graduate students,” Espinosa said. Hardin said that all academic disciplines are rep resented in the programs. “What we look to do is coordinate summer re search activities for many of the programs,” Hardin said. Similar programs are in place across the campus, including programs in the College of Agriculture, the College of Engineering and the College of Vet erinary Medicine. Participants must maintain at least a 2.75 GPR during the academic year, be enrolled as a student at Texas A&M during the program and be a U.S. citizen and a permanent resident of Texas. Application packets must include a completed SROP application, a complete official copy of under graduate transcripts that include Fall 1997 grades and one letter of recommendation on departmental let terhead from a faculty member. The application deadline is March 2, 1998. Stu dents interested may contact Fidel Fernandez at (409) 845-3631 or by e-mail at fidel@tamu.edu. Enrollment figures show 900 more students at UT this spring AUSTIN (AP) — Preliminary spring enrollment figures at the Uni versity of Texas at Austin show an overall increase from last spring, but the number of black students has. remained the same and the number of Hispanics has declined slightly. Enrollment of 46,364 is an in crease of 890 students from spring 1997, UT said Monday. Fi nal enrollment figures will be available in March. Preliminary figures show 30,307 white students, compared with 29,718 in spring 1997. Black stu dents total 1,660, the same as last spring, while the number of His panic students has dipped from 5,872 last spring to 5,828. The number of Asian Ameri can students, meanwhile, has in creased from 4,722 in spring 1997 to 5,084. The number of Ameri can Indian students also has risen, from 201 to 217. Ethnicity was unknown for 30 students. The figures include 34,825 un dergraduates, 10,111 graduate stu dents and 1,428 law students.