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Wildcats lace up their spikes in preparation for the 2010 season PAGE 7
Arizona Daily Wildcat
The independent student voice of the University of Arizona since 1899 tuesday, february , dailywildcat.com
tucson, arizona
Campus diversity on the rise New UA Web site fixing issues By Taylor Avey ARIZONA DAILY WILDCAT
Diversity at the UA is at an alltime high, meeting President Robert Shelton’s goal four years ago. When Shelton first addressed students and faculty in 2006, he vowed to increase diversity at the UA. Based on the latest data from the UA Factbook for the 2008-09 school year, diversity is
up among faculty and students. “(Diversity is) essential to our success,” Shelton said. “Just look at the world around us.” According to the data, the 2008-09 school year saw a total of 2,351 international students, including undergraduate and graduate students – 1,419 men and 932 women. There was an increase of more than 50 international students from the 2006-07
school year. Since that same year, enrollment for black undergraduate students increased by 150 students. Enrollment among undergraduate Hispanic students increased by 384 students. Enrollment among undergraduate Asian/Pacific Islander students increased by 247 students. Enrollment among undergraduate American Indian/Alaskan Native students increased by 124 students. The numbers might not be staggering
on paper, but students noticed an increase in diversity on campus. “I feel like the campus makes a considerable effort to be diverse,” said Isaac Cox, a creative writing freshman. “I see a lot of Asian people, people from Mexico and people from different ethnic backgrounds.” Not all students agree with Cox. DIVERSITY, page 5
STANDING TALL
‘Cats’ need volunteers
By Jazmine Woodberry ARIZONA DAILY WILDCAT
Cats in the Community needs around 300 volunteers to help a UA affiliated middle school. Cats Day is an annual event sponsored by Cats in the Community in which students and faculty help revamp a school in Tucson. This year, Cats in the Community will be helping out the Wildcat School, which is a non-profit charter middle school that caters to underprivileged children and is associated with the UA. According to the school, 96 percent of its students qualify for reduced lunches. The school uses science and research resources from the university and prepares and motivates them to go to college. Also, UA graduate students from the College of Education have helped the school’s faculty plan curriculum and learn teaching skills. Volunteers will work on many projects including painting murals, building tables and benches and helping to create a sustainable garden. Cats Day will take place on March 6 between 8 a.m. and 3:30 p.m. at the Wildcat School located at 25 E. Drachman St. Volunteers are able to register online for different shifts, which are 8 - 11:30 a.m., 11 a.m. - 2:30 p.m. and 1:30 - 3:30 p.m.Volunteers are encouraged to bring their families. “A little goes a long way, and it can be really meaningful for people to volunteer and reach out,” said Holly Altman, director of outreach and community partnerships in the Office of Community Relations. In Jackson Boelts’ art class, UA graphic design students are given the chance to work extensively on the project. “Students in groups of four to five visit the environment, then create murals, pick furniture and wall colors, flooring and then present their solutions to the Cats in the Community committee and representatives from the organization, which are then judged,”Boelts said. Students who have their work selected are then in charge of the creative element and help manage the volunteers. The class learns to create environmental designs for a real project and participate on a university committee, manage volunteers and help a non-profit agency. “This is a(n) exciting experience for all involved. The students get a wonderful portfolio piece and the reward of seeing a project for a non-profit come to fruition,” Boelts said. In the past, Cats in the Community has helped the Tucson Community Food Bank, the Primavera Foundation and Project YES! — Bethany Barnes
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Can you help? When: March 6 Shifts Available: 8 -11:30 a.m., 11 a.m - 2:30 p.m. and 1:30 - 3:30 p.m. How to Volunteer: visit www.catsincommunity.arizona.edu
Fun fact:
Last year Wildcat School went from “Underperforming” to “Performing Plus” and from “Not Making Adequate Yearly Progress” to “Making Adequate Yearly Progress”
The new UA homepage has been under construction after its first attempt to go online in early December. Problems, which bogged down the new version of the Web site, are being adjusted. More than $116,000 was spent on initial costs of the Web site. The new site was designed and built by Archetype 5, an outside contractor. Additional funds totaling nearly $30,000 are going toward hardware costs for new servers and small software additions, said Kate Maguire Jensen, assistant vice president of marketing at UA. The new Web site ran smoothly for a few days, but then had some technical difficulties, according to Patti Van Leer, a UA marketing specialist at the Office of Student Computing Resources. Van Leer worked with the incident command council that was formed to fix the problems of the new Web site. Slowness of “We have search feaconfidence that tures was the bigwe’ve fixed the gest user problems … but complaint, we can’t really which presented a guarantee that mysterious until (it goes problem: live).” the site — Patti Van Leer acted as if UA marketing specialist the server at the Office of Student was overComputing Resources loaded, but when a check was performed, the servers didn’t show any overloading issues, according to Van Leer. “We went through this very methodical approach where we made a change to the Web site, studied what happened and un(did) that change,” said Van Leer. It took several weeks of that process for the problem to even be replicated in a test environment so they could figure out how to fix the glitch. Derek Masseth, who works on the incident command council, noted the site has certain benefits as well as drawbacks.
Gordon Bates/Arizona Daily Wildcat
Dominic Bergeman, a chemistry freshman, was out jogging on his stilts while Michael Lien, a microbiology freshman, skateboards along with him. The two were spotted traveling down the UA Mall on Monday afternoon.
WEBSITE, page 5
UA running for Playboy’s top party school By Zach Sokolow ARIZONA DAILY WILDCAT The question on Playboy’s mind — is the UA the top party school in the country? Voting has started for Playboy Magazine’s ranking of the top party schools. Students are encouraged to nominate a school. The magazine compiles a ranking system for the top-rated party schools across the nation every year. Playboy’s editors have a system that allows them to determine the most important factors in ranking the top party schools across the country. UA was ranked number five in the 2009 edition of Playboy’s Party School rankings. An excerpt from the 2009 rankng reads, “The Zona school that traditionally gets the love is ASU, and though we think Tempe is a great place to spend a three-day weekend, four years are better spent at U of A in Tucson. Consider some of its party names: Natural Disaster, Heaven and Hell, Fubar, Jungle Party. Sounds wild.” The rankings are determined by the
magazine’s editorial staff based on informal surveys of college students, university alumni and Playboy’s network of campus representatives at more than 50 schools nationwide. Playboy has compiled these rankings four times and has decided to make it an annual feature. The criteria for the rankings include campus, brains, sports, bikini index and sex. According to Steve Mazeika, a publicist for Playboy Enterprises,“The editors will also follow a mathematical format to determine the top schools. For example, the ‘campus’ index uses an algorithm that includes multiplying and adding certain factors, such as number of bars, gallons of beer consumed per year in the state and total enrollment.” Playboy does not only look into the overall party scene; it also considers other factors that promote the overall campus life of the universities. It looks at the strength of the school’s academic and athletic programs, in addition to the local music scene, school spirit and PLAYBOY, page 5
Gordon Bates/Arizona Daily Wildcat
Students in their undies take over the UA Mall Nov. 5, 2009, just before running a few near-birthday-suit laps. Playboy put the UA at fifth in its 2009 edition of Playboy’s Party School rankings.
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