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Times-Delphic
Monday April 08, 2013
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Campus Calendar Monday
Bucksbaum Lecture
Student Senate
Balancing art and science
Election preparation
“How a Dog Changed My Ideas on Making Art” 4:30-6 p.m. FAC 336
Emma Wilson
Staff Writer emma.wilson@drake.edu
The Changing Business of Media 6:30-8 p.m. Meredith 101
Tuesday The Rob Scheps/Jerry Dodgion Quintet 7:30-9:30 p.m. Turner Jazz Center DogTUBE & SAB Film Festival 2.0 7 p.m. Meredith 101 Student Senate Election All day BlueView Arts & Sciences Honor Convocation 6:30-8 p.m. Parents Hall
Wednesday Blitz Day Picnic 4-7 p.m. Parents Hall Human Trafficking Panel 6-8 p.m. Meredith 101 Social Movement & Political Moments 7-8:30 p.m. Sussman Theater
Inside News
The candidates “tweet” their platform PAGE 2
Opinions Voting should be based upon the candidate, ideas PAGE 3
Features Online portfolio, Pressfolios, is a new way to save clips PAGE 4
Sports Track and field takes home a win at Ashford Invite PAGE 6
Campus News
JAMES BALOG presents his Bucksbaum speech at the Knapp Center on April 3. Balog spoke about climate change. Last week’s lecture marked the 30th anniversary of the series on campus. LUKE NANKIVELL | PHOTO EDITOR Emily Sadecki
Staff Writer emily.sadecki@drake.edu
Natural photographer James Balog captured the attention of the Knapp Center at Drake University Wednesday night as he addressed misconceptions revolving around global climate change. Balog spoke as part of the Bucksbaum Lecture Series established in 1966 by Martin and Melva Bucksbaum and is continued in their memory. Martin Bucksbaum was the chairman and CEO of Central Growth Corporation, a member of Drake’s governing board and a leader in the Des Moines community. At the beginning of the presentation, Drake University President David Maxwell announced that the university is proud to host American astrophysicist Neil DeGrasse Tyson on Oct. 29, 2013, for the next installment of the Bucksbaum Lecture Series. “The Bucksbaum Lectures are such a privilege to Drake’s campus,” first-year Jenna Sheldon said. “Many influential people speak at these lectures and make the Des
Moines and Drake community that much richer. It is important that these lectures come to Iowa to keep worldly and informed.” Throughout his career, Balog has found himself at the crossroads of art, with his photography, and science, as he studies glacial patterns. According to the “Extreme Ice Survey” website, “28 cameras are deployed at 13 glaciers in Greenland, Iceland, the Nepalese Himalaya, Alaska and the Rocky Mountains of the U.S. These cameras record changes in the glaciers every half-hour, yearround during daylight, yielding approximately 8,000 frames per camera per year.” “Art and science are about bringing the left brain and the right brain together,” Balog said. “I never understood the power of photography until I started this project.” “As an art major, it’s always refreshing to see an artistic perspective on such a global issue,” first-year Susanna Hayward said. He described how the glaciers act as a “bermometer,” which he explains as a combination be-
tween a barometer and a thermometer. “It is exquisitely sensitive, it is almost alive,” Balog said. His images preserve a visual legacy of the glaciers that are ceasing to exist and will be useful in years to come in revealing the impacts of climate change and human activities. “Nature isn’t natural anymore,” he said, making his point with a variety of graphs showing the unnatural peaks of carbon dioxide and the effect that those chemicals have on the atmosphere. Balog hopes that through his work, he can shed light on the misconception that humans cannot change earth, because the evidence points strongly in the other direction. He argues that it affects all humans because we all breathe air, eat, drink water and pay taxes, so we should all be doing our part. Balog quoted Sir Edmund Hillary saying, “You don’t have to be a fantastic hero to do certain things, to compete. You can be just an ordinary chap sufficiently motivated to reach challenging goals.”
J-term fair helps students make class selections Comparing course offerings, syllabi allows for a deeper look into subject matter
Sarah Fulton
Staff Writer sarah.fulton@drake.edu
Vying for student’s attention, 82 classes set up booths in Parents Hall Thursday night during the second J-term fair. The fair grew from 43 courses last year to 24 travel seminars and 58 on-campus courses this year. J-term committee chair Arthur Sanders was “very pleased” with the student response to the fair. “We did it last year, and we had a great response, lots of people came,” Sanders said. “So, it is still a pretty new kind of thing, so we decided to do it again and give students an opportunity to find out information.” Assistant Professor of Environmental Science and Policy Kathryn Szramek is teaching “En-
vironmental Hazard,” a class that will cover the impact of hazards such as volcanos, earthquakes and population growth. She is excited to teach the course. “Environmental hazards is one really awesome ... and why I chose to teach this particular class is because it is the kind of class that you can do in three weeks,” Szramek said. “It is exciting, interesting and there are a lot of visuals, experiments and hands-on things that we can do in the three weeks.” Szramek said her class was receiving decent amount of student interests but not as much as the travel seminars. However, she said that her class is still worthwhile. “Even though we are not in a grand adventure out in the world, we can still have some pretty great fun here at Drake,” Szramek said.
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Sophomore graphic design major and advertising double major Lexi Ruskell took part because she did not attend last year. “I totally missed the opportunity last year, and I thought I would check it out,” Ruskell said. “I also need to catch up on some of my classes.” The “Introduction to Letterpress” class caught Ruskell’s eye. “The print-making one stuck out me a lot because I am interested in it, and it is something that I could incorporate into my major,” Ruskell said. The fair helped Ruskell make her decision. “Looking around, they had a lot of examples you could pick from, examples of the work you can do,” Ruskell said. Katie Hanson, a sophomore
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graphic design major, came to look for an art class to apply toward her majors and is now leaning toward the “Book Binding Workshop” taught by professor John Fender. “I know Fender is going on sabbatical next spring, so I will not have very many classes with him,” Hanson said. The “Book Binding Workshop” also caught the attention of P1 Blake Martin. Martin came to the fair looking for “anything art” to fulfill an AOI. “I like drawing first of all. I am looking for something that is not to hard, so book binding would be good,” Martin said. Martin said the fair was mainly helpful in providing information. “I got more information here than I would get looking at the course descriptions,” Martin said.
Student Senate opened its meeting last week with a message from some of the candidates running in the upcoming election. The candidates were encouraged to attend Senate this week to give a short presentation of their platform for the current senators. Eighteen of the 27 candidates attended the meeting. Senator-atLarge candidates Ben Verhasselt, Mark Reiter, Olivia O’Hea, Emma Wilson, Mike Jennings, Josh Duden, Jacob VanderVaart, Ethan Gascho, Zachary Keller, Emily Grimm, Ekta Haria, Josh Schoenblatt and Cole Schwartz spoke at the meeting. Diversity Interest Senator-atLarge candidate Salwa Janjua, CBPA senator candidate Kevin Maisto, Arts and Sciences Senator candidate Ben Lambrecht, Pharmacy and Health Sciences Senator candidate Natalie Gadbois and Journalism and Mass Communications Senator Gwendolyn Baumgardner also spoke at the meeting. The Ultimate Club came to Senate last week requesting to change the amount of money it had previously requested from SFAC. The group planned to attend a tournament in Decorah, Iowa, but the tournament was cancelled. It already paid for a hotel, however, so the group requested $250 to cover the costs of the hotel. The motion passed unanimously. The Middle East Peace and Prosperity Alliance came to Senate to request funding for donation jars. The money raised from the donation jars will be donated to a hospital in Israel that provides medical service to Palestinians who are otherwise denied access to specialized medical treatment. The donation jars will be placed in high traffic areas of campus and around the Des Moines community. The motion carried unanimously. Greek Street Fellowship requested a name change during the meeting. The group feels there is a division on campus between those involved with Greek life and those who are not, so it wants to make the group open to anyone on campus. The group changed its name to “The Navigators,” and the motion was passed by acclimation. Most of the Senate meeting last week was spent reviewing the budget for fiscal year 2013-14. Senate will not vote on the budget until later this year, but the senators were encouraged to share their opinions on the current state of the budget. Vice President of Student Life David Karaz expressed concerns that Senate should look into funding more organizations. Sen. Dan Pfeifle sparked a debate when he suggested that Student Activities Board had been given too much money. “They’re spending a lot of money on entertainment that not a lot of students are taking advantage of,” Pfeifle said. Treasurer Michael Reibel countered Pfeifle. “They’ve done a lot with collaboration with other organizations recently to create greater attendance at their events,” Reibel said. The proposed budget is posted in Olmsted. Student Senate elections will be held April 8 and 9 on BlueView.
Meet the Candidates Learn about their platform and what they think the biggest issues on campus are.
Check it out on page 2
Drake University, Des Moines
THE TIMES-DELPHIC
Vol. 132 | No. 40 | April 08, 2013