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Arizona Daily Wildcat
The independent student voice of the University of Arizona since 1899 tuesday, february , dailywildcat.com
tucson, arizona
Rec Center cuts the ribbon New app targets safer driving By Jazmine Woodberry ARIZONA DAILY WILDCAT
Lisa Beth Earle/Arizona Daily Wildcat
From left: Former regent Fred Boice, UA Vice President for Student Affairs Melissa M. Vito, and UACampus Recreation Director Juliette Moore cut the ribbon during the grand opening ceremony of the Student Recreation Center expansion on Monday. Also with them was Jean Roberts, widow of Richard “Dick” Roberts, who was the UA budget director for 22 years.
Grand opening honors expansion’s sustainability, space By Luke Money ARIZONA DAILY WILDCAT UA faculty, students and administrators gathered for the grand opening ceremony of the new Student Recreation Center expansion on Monday. The ceremony, dubbed “The Big Green Event”in honor of the expansion’s
sustainability efforts, was the final step in a project that was five years in the making. “Five years ago, we had a lot of complaints from students about the size of the Rec Center,” said Juliette Moore, director of campus recreation. “There were long lines for everything and long waits for machines, so students called together for an expansion.”
Taking into account the complaints of UA students, the Recreation Advisory Committee, a collection of students and faculty on campus, put together a proposal to expand and update the recreation center. “It’s amazing to think about the planning that went into this center,” said MelissaVito, UA vice president for student
affairs. “When I look at this center, I see something that has not only raised the bar, but created a new standard for the 21st century recreation center.” The expansion proposal was eventually accepted after UA students voted in 2006 to extend a $25 fee for three years. The fee OPENING, page 3
Former Miss America visits UA By Bethany Barnes ARIZONA DAILY WILDCAT
Kirsten Haglund, the 2008 Miss America, encouraged UA students to love their bodies and accept that they can’t please everyone. Students piled into the MAC gym in the Student Recreation Center to hear Haglund’s message Monday night. According to Haglund, 30 percent of college women have eating disorders. “The saddest thing about eating disorders is it steals all joy from your life,” Haglund said. Haglund developed anorexia through her involvement with ballet and said she began eating disorder behaviors at 12 when she went away for the summer to an intense ballet school. “It was the most horrible experience of my life,”Haglund said. It wasn’t until three summers later that she got help. During her struggle with anorexia, Haglund said she lost friends and became a shell of the person she used to be. For the first six months of treatment, Haglund said she was in denial, but eventually she began to feel better. “Food becomes the best medicine,” said Haglund who noted she enjoyed working with a nutritionist and having more energy. Haglund said she became involved with pageants as a way to get scholarship money and did not expect to win. “I swear I did not put in any effort,”
said Haglund as she explained that her evening gown was her prom dress and her talent costume cost her $5. According to Haglund, pageants gave her the opportunity to find encouragement through public speaking and an opportunity to share her experience with eating disorders. “The coolest part about the year (as Miss America) was that I got tested a lot,” Haglund said.“I was ripped apart for my appearance.” Haglund said she could not believe how cruel people could be, and that she learned she would never please everyone. Through Miss America, Haglund saw that people don’t look the way they are portrayed in magazines. Haglund saw herself digitally retouched, realized the images didn’t reflect reality and was able to ask on several occasions for the retouches to be removed because she felt she did not look like herself. Haglund said she feels it is important for college students who are struggling or suspect someone is struggling with an eating disorder to get help. “People do die from these things,” she said. Haglund also stressed the importance of eliminating “fat talk,” which is obsessively talking about weight and being fat. “It’s so normal and commonplace, but it doesn’t have to be,”she said. Students said they were inspired by Haglund’s message. “I thought it was really touching that
Gordon Bates/Arizona Daily Wildcat
Kirsten Haglund, the 21-year-old and 2008 Miss America, came the Student Recreation Center Monday, to speak about Love Your Body Day and to raise awareness on eating disorders.
she could express such an emotional experience in her life,” said nutritional science senior Rosie Thornton. Former Miss Arizona and UA alumna Erin Nurss suggested having Haglund speak at the UA. “In all my interactions, I just found that Kirsten (Haglund) has such an important message,”Nurss said. Getting funding from eating disorder treatment centers to bring Haglund to the UA was simple, according to Gale Welter, coordinator of nutrition services
and Campus Health Service. “They all knew of her and were thrilled to support her.” Love Your Body Day also coincided with the Rec Center’s grand opening Monday. Welter said working with the Rec Center turned out to be a beautiful partnership. In addition to Haglund’s visit, students were encouraged to fill out a healthy body image survey for Love Your Body Day as part of an annual national screening for disorderly eating, Welter said.
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Drivers face many distractions on the road everyday, but ASafeDrive, a new iPhone app, tries to aid new and old drivers alike. ASafeDrive tells drivers their own driving speed as well as the speed limit on the road on which they are driving. Working on their third installment of the application, ASafeDrive differs from many other applications in that it can be used all over the world. As soon as one driver inputs the speed limit for a particular street, it is then tracked by the program’s global positioning device, approved by the application and accessible to any other application user. Signals of surpassed speed limits included flashing red screens, small sounds and vibrations. Alex BenBassat, Accidents are the creator of unavoidable, ASafeDrive 3.0, notes that but limiting this is just the distractions first of many and inattention steps he is taking to aid is something young drivers we can and appease change. investors. “I’m build— Sgt. Juan ing a speed limit database Alvarez at the same public information time as I’m officer for UAPD entertaining people with this app,” he said.“This is one idea, but it’s a small piece in a huge puzzle … to help young drivers.” BenBassat was inspired to create this application by his own driving. “I was driving, trying to do like ten things at once,”BenBassat said, noting distractions while driving in Los Angeles. Distracted driving is just the kind of thing that police, especially around crowded college campuses like the UA, want to prevent. “Driving is a dynamic activity … there’s a lot of things that a person has to do to drive safely,” said Sgt. Juan Alvarez, public information officer of the University of Arizona Police Department.“Accidents are unavoidable, but limiting distractions and inattention is something we can change.” Linda Gorman, public affairs director for the American Automobile Association for Arizona, sees distractions while driving as a dangerous element, as AAA Arizona just lobbied for a ban on texting while driving. The No Texting While Driving Act, which passed with a 5-0 vote on Feb. 12 in the Arizona Senate Committee on Natural Resources, Infrastructure and Public Debt, will move on to the Arizona House of Representatives. Although AAA Arizona does not have an official position on the ASafeDrive and other safe driving applications, they generally discourage anything that takes focus off the road. “A lot of these applications are distracting in and of themselves,” said Gorman. “We want people to stay 100 percent focused on their driving.” Despite contentious debate, BenBassat has gotten “positive reviews” for the application. ASafeDrive costs 99 cents and is available now on Apple iPhones and the later version of Verizon Droid phones as well.
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