wednesday, september 16, 2009
DW wildlife
Do the robot
Club Congress hosts humanoids and androids for a rollicking ‘bot-swap page b3
DW
...Bueller? ... Bueller?
tucson, arizona
Treat adults like kids and they’ll act like them: why resting grades on roll call doesn’t work. page a4 opinions
Arizona Daily Wildcat
dailywildcat.com
Serving the Harvard of the Grand Canyon State since 1899
Financial aid reform bill hits Congress By David Lightman McClatchy Newspapers
WASHINGTON — The House of Representatives is expected this week to back overhauling — and simplifying — how college students receive financial aid. The rules for awarding and repaying loans would remain unchanged, but the government would make all loans itself, ending the practice of subsidizing loans made by private lenders. The Obama administration, which has made revamping the student loan system a major domestic priority, has hailed the
Shelton, staff talk budget By Will Ferguson Arizona Daily Wildcat President Robert Shelton addressed questions and concerns from faculty and staff at the Gallagher Theater yesterday. Shelton opened the meeting by outlining the university’s troubled financial situation and the impact that the university’s budget is having on employees. He said the university has lost $100 million from the state budget over the last two years. Seventeen percent of the budget was cut last year and the university is expecting to lose an additional 5 percent in fiscal year 2010. Due to federal stimulus requirements, the state cannot cut the university’s budget below 2006 levels. While nearly all the budget numbers showed substantial losses of state revenue for the university, Shelton said the administration will not be instituting furloughs for university faculty and employees this year. In order to counterbalance the losses of state funding to the university system, Gov. Jan Brewer presented the UA with $60 million in federal stimulus money for the 2010 school year and an additional $50 million for the 2011 school year. However, federal stimulus money will not be available after fiscal year 2011, an impact Shelton has described as a“fiscal cliff.”By fiscal year 2011 the university is expecting a salary deficit of $70 to $75 million. Shelton said over the next two years university administration, employees and faculty need to work together to come up with independent sources of funding. “A new strategy has to be in play by 2012,”he said. Shelton attempted to separate fact from rumor with regard to layoffs and budget cuts, saying that on the very first day he arrived he made a pledge to the university’s deans that he would reveal budgets the day they came out. Once these numbers are available, they will be accessible through Human Resources, he said. “We are on the edge of losing top-notch faculty and employees that the university needs to remain competitive,”Shelton said. A chief concern among those at the meeting was how the university determines where to make budget cuts and where to provide funding. He emphasized that it isn’t up to the administration to determine what particular units in each department to cut. Shelton said the administration places a priority on giving tuition dollars to departments that do more teaching, but funding for departments is determined by several factors. In addition to the amount of teaching done by individual units, the administration considers how good certain departments BUDGET, page A3
bill as historic. “This is a big, big deal,”Education Secretary Arne Duncan said Tuesday at a news conference. House Education and Labor Committee Chairman George Miller, D-Calif., vowed that the legislation would help students at“no cost to taxpayers.” That depends on how one interprets budget data, however. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office found that the loan program changes should save the government $86.8 billion over the next 10 years. It also noted in its official July report
on the bill, however, that it would include spending all but $7.8 billion of that on aid to students and higher education. In an update last week, the CBO said economic changes could boost spending overall by $10.5 billion, meaning that the bill could add to the deficit. “The truth is, no one really knows how much this plan will cost,” said Rep. John Kline , R-Minn., the senior Education and Labor Committee Republican. Independent analysts agreed. Changes in the loan program will “save a big chunk of money,” said Marc FINANCIAL AID, page A3
By Alex Dalenberg Arizona Daily Wildcat The Arizona Students’ Association will be on the UA Mall today to raise support and awareness for the Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act, a financial bid reform bill going before Congress this month. The student lobbying group will be asking students who owe money for college to sign bricks which will be used to build a symbolic “wall of debt.” “Most students don’t know what the fiscal responsibility act is,” said Nicole
Pasteur , an ASA student director. “Hopefully it will be sort of eyeopening and encourage students to explore (the bill) further,” she said. ASA will be on the Mall from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. as part of a statewide“Day of Action”urging Congress to pass the bill. Event organizers said they want to bring some attention back to financial aid reform. “Student involvement is crucial because health care has taken so much of the focus,” said Elma Delic -, vice chair for the ASA board of directors. “It’s huge for students,” she said.
Hyundai gives to kids’ center A patient from the Steele Children’s Research Center paints his handprint on a white Hyundai Santa Fe that will travel the country before being auctioned off as a part of Hyundai’s Hope on Wheels program. Hope on Wheels donated $40,000 to the Steele Center for childhood cancer research. Mike Christy/ Arizona Daily Wildcat
Mike Christy/Arizona Daily Wildcat
Giovanni Lozano, 2, left, places his handprint on the shirt of Hyundai’s Doug Shaffer during the Hyundai Hope on Wheels event outside the UA College of Medicine on Tuesday. The money donated by Hyundai will aid Brenda Wittman, named a Hyundai scholar, in her research in bacterial infection and blood clotting related to central venous catheters.
By Marissa Hopkins Arizona Daily Wildcat Childhood cancer patients painted colorful handprints on a white Hyundai Santa Fe yesterday morning after Hyundai’s Hope on Wheels donated $40,000 to the UA Steele Children’s Research Center for childhood cancer research. Brenda Wittman, a researcher at the center, was chosen as a Hyundai scholar for her research in bacterial infection and blood clotting related to central venous catheters. She said reducing clotting and infection will reduce the amount of time children have to spend in the hospital and improve their quality of life. After Sam Brnovich, Hyundai’s general manager of the western region, presented a check for $20,000 to the
Steele Center, the Hyundai Jim Click family presented another $20,000 check for the research. Brnovich said he was pleasantly surprised by the amount the Jim Click family donated, especially given the current economic climate. The Hope on Wheels program was started in Boston in 1998 and became a national program in 2004, Brnovich said. Dr. Fayez Ghishan, director of the Steele Center, said the support of corporations like Hyundai is very important to their research and to improving the lives of children. All of the children who participated in putting their handprints on the car got tshirts and gift bags. The decorated Santa Fe will be traveling around the country before it is auctioned off, Brnovich said.
Raza studies celebrates 40 years By Marissa Freireich Arizona Daily Wildcat Students, faculty and community members will gather today to celebrate 40 years of Raza studies. The ethnic studies program educates students about Latino and Chicano culture from a multi-cultural perspective. The goal of the event is to inform the community about Raza studies, according to Roberto Rodriguez, an assistant professor in Mexican American studies. “The idea is to strengthen the rela-
tionship between the communities we serve,” Rodriguez said. “It’s a cry to say we are human and all are human.” Participants from several communinty organizations, including Raza Studies TUSD and Mexican American and Raza Studies UA, will attend the event, which will take place in Cesar Chavez rooms 205 through 209 from 4 to 6 p.m. Rodriguez said there has always been opposition toward Raza studies because some people view it as un-American. Last year the UA proposed the combination of the four principal campus
cultural centers. The centers have a historic presence on campus and in the community, according to Rodriguez. He said the community told the administration that they did not approve of this decision, and the centers remained separate. This past summer, the state legislature proposed a bill that would eliminate funding for ethnic studies in K-12 education. “To be told that you cannot teach something is the same as saying there are things you cannot learn,”Rodriguez said.
For more information: www.career.arizona.edu
To protest this bill, a group of about 150 members of the Tucson community marched from the Tucson Unified School District building to Joaquin Murrieta Park. About 50 students, faculty and community members continued from Tucson to Phoenix in the summer heat in relay fashion over a three-day period. The state legislature ended up dropping the bill, according to Rodriguez. “It wasn’t like we were dumb and crazy. It was to show that this is what we believe in,”he said.