LIFE CENTRAL MICHIGAN
Fighting the flu
LEARN HOW TO STAY HEALTHY ON CAMPUS »PAGE 7
Wednesday, jan. 28, 2015 | MOUNT PLEASANT, MICH. | ISSUE NO. 50 VOL. 96
SPORTS Detroit Lions kicker Hanson to speak on campus Wednesday The Detroit Lions all-time leading scorer will be in Mount Pleasant on Wednesday night to speak to students. Jason Hanson will speak at 7:30 p.m. in the Football Team Meeting Room, presented by the CMU Fellowship of Christian Athletes. All are welcome to the event. Hanson was the kicker for the Detroit Lions from 1992-2012 and has 2,150 career points. Only Morten Andersen and Gary Anderson have more career points in NFL history. Hanson was the longesttenured Lion and set an NFL record for the most seasons with one team. The Lions selected the Washington State graduate in the second round of the 1992 NFL Draft, the season after Detroit’s last playoff victory. Hanson hit 21 of his 22 field goal attempts in the Lions 0-16 season in 2008. He made 82.4 percent of his field goal attempts in his career with a career long of 56 yards. In his final season, 2012, Hanson hit all 14 attempts inside the 40-yard line and scored 134 total points, the most of his career in a single season.
Bookstore addresses gift card abuse Students rack up $45,000 in gift card purchases for food, travel in 2014 By Jacob Kahn Staff Reporter
Cash strapped students used to be able to use the Central Michigan University Bookstore to charge entertainment expenses to their university accounts. By purchasing gift cards available at the bookstore through their CMU
accounts, students accumulated large sums for products ranging from Amazon and iTunes to Southwest Airlines tickets. It wasn’t until $45,000 was charged to student accounts in 2014, that bookstore officials decided to discontinue the service. Students charging inordinate amounts to their accounts for gift cards will have to pay back their
balance only a year after the service was introduced. Barry Waters, director of the CMU Bookstore, was troubled by the substantial charges to student accounts for gift card sales. Students were able to charge significant amounts to their accounts for things other typical bookstore purchases because items purchased are not specified on account statements. “You could buy a $500 Amazon gift card, and it shows up on the account as ‘bookstore,’ not ‘gift card,’” Waters said. In the 12 months that gift cards were available for purchase through
It started with
SCALE
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Life in brief
Taylor DesOrmeau, Staff Reporter
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By Sydney Smith News Editor
t his heaviest, David Roden weighed in at 404 pounds. Today, the Grand Rapids senior is lighter on his feet—140 pounds lighter.
UNIVERSITY
SIBLINGS WEEKEND
Events kick off Friday, Jan. 30 in Finch Field House.
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ATTENDANCE
EDITORIAL
Men’s basketball gives us a reason to fire up this winter.
Emily Mesner | Staff Photographer
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David Roden wears an old sweatshirt after his weight loss on Friday, Jan. 23 in Moore Hall.
In high school, Roden was pre-diabetic and had knee problems. Aside from the physical effects of being severely overweight, Roden said he felt like a complete failure. He was tired all the time and unhappy with himself. He even contemplated ending his life. “I hated who I was as a person,” Roden said. “I was always known as a happy, laughing person. Inside I really hated myself.” Throughout high school, Roden’s parents tried to motivate him to live a healthier lifestyle. His mother Karen said she was worried about his future. “His father and I were concerned about his long-term health,” Karen said. “We decided it was something David need to do on his own.” Roden’s mother was right. Until deciding to lose weight for himself, nothing worked. “For me, it’s not really about how you lose weight, it’s more why you want to lose weight,” he said. “That’s when it clicked.” In the last year-and-a-half, Roden’s life has changed significantly. While losing weight, he read anything he could get his hands on about health and motivation. Roden said he looks at his new habits as a lifestyle change as opposed to calling them a diet. “Diet has a negative connotation,” he said. “People hear the word and they think of all the w scale | 2
CORRECTIONS An article published Monday, Jan. 26 incorrectly reported that CMU’s boiler four was to be converted to steam. All four boilers in the powerhouse produce steam to heat water for campus use. The boiler mentioned was being coverted to burning natural gas. Also, boiler five produces 85,000 pounds of steam per hour, not 8,500. Boiler five is the main boiler, but boilers one and two operate during winter to meet campus heating demands. One and two are the boilers that are 54 years old, not boiler five. Central Michigan Life regrets these erros.
Baylen Brown | Staff Photographer David Roden, a Central Michigan University senior, mixes ingredients to make his protein shake on Tuesday at his apartment in Mount Pleasant. “People act like it’s gross, putting spinach in it,” Roden laughs. “But you never taste it with all the other good stuff, and it has lots of protein.”
student accounts, the charges came to a total of $44,489.98. About $31,000 was charged to stores and restaurants that serve alcohol. “The reports were startling,” Waters said. “I was concerned students were abusing the privilege to buy things that were not intended to be bought.” Thousands of dollars were being charged for gift cards to establishments that sell alcohol or tobacco, like Buffalo Wild Wings or local gas stations. “We’ve discontinued the ability to purchase gift cards using student w bookstore | 2
SGA offers students legal advice By Jordyn Hermani Staff Reporter
For the fifth consecutive year, the Central Michigan University Student Government Association will partner with legal fraternity Phi Alpha Delta to offer free legal counseling to students. Although the legal clinic has been open since 2010, this will be the first full year that landlord and tenant legal counseling will be offered to students by the legal fraternity. SGA President Chuck Mahone said the idea for the newest addition to the clinic came to them when SGA noticed a large influx of advice seekers attended for counsel on renting houses and apartments. “When we had the legal clinic, one of the trends we were seeing was that when students were renting properties, they weren’t understanding their rights. They weren’t understanding what they can and can’t do,” he said. “(SGA) decided to make our own subsection of the legal clinic that focused solely and directly on that because we were getting such a high volume of students who had concerns about (tenants and landlords clinic).” Students suggested the addition of tenant and landlord counseling would be useful. Sparta senior Daniel Metivier said the clinic is overall “a good idea.” “Having (these) facilities could be a good step towards students educating themselves,” Metivier said. “Most students wouldn’t know where to start (with legal counseling) so that would at least give them a stepping stone.” Mahone described the newest subsection’s addition as being “pretty successful.” The most traffic for the clinic, he said, generally comes around Welcome Weekend and move-in days. “It’s basically a pro-bono legal clinic,” Mahone said. “Students can come in, tell us their problems, and if they don’t know how to proceed we can offer them legal advice.” From there, Mahone said students would be able to meet with attorneys Hope May, Gordon Bloem and William Sherley in order to discuss possible courses of action. Zach Diederichs, director of CMU SGA Legal Clinic, said students interested in meeting with a lawyer must first send an email through the Orgsync page and a representative would contact them for a meeting. “There is a formal way of setting up an appointment through the Orgsync legal clinic page,” Diederichs said. “If (students) give w LEGAL CLINIC | 6
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