DAILY LOBO new mexico
MONDAY February 2, 2015 | Vo l u m e 1 1 9 | I s s u e 9 3
The Independent Student Voice of UNM since 1895
Proposal aims to reduce child abuse in state By Sayyed Shah The New Mexico Legislature is considering a proposal to fund the establishment of a new center at UNM specializing in child maltreatment. Funding will allow the Child Abuse Response Team at the UNM Health Sciences Center to bring in staff dedicated to supporting the center and expand clinical services to better reach areas outlying the metro area, said Dr. Leslie Strickler, medical director for the Child Abuse Response Team and associate professor of pediatrics at UNM Children’s Hospital. “Our goal is to improve clinical care, education, advocacy and collaboration between all stakeholders and incorporate primary, secondary and tertiary prevention initiatives,” Strickler said. Funding will allow CART to better recognize risk for abuse, occurrence of abuse and ultimately decrease the prevalence of abuse in New Mexico, she said. As compared to other states in the United States, New Mexico sees higher rates of abuse per capita and a greater number of deaths due to child abuse, Strickler said. While New Mexico’s ranking rose slightly from 50th in 2013 to 49th in 2014 in the national KIDS COUNT rankings of child wellbeing, state policymakers have not managed to make much progress toward improving how the state cares for its kids, according to a press release by New Mexico Voices for Children, a nonpartisan, statewide advocacy organization founded in 1987 by a group of pediatricians. The KIDS COUNT program
measures 16 indicators of child wellbeing, and New Mexico saw improvement in just five of those, the statement said. “Worse, child poverty — a main factor in poor outcomes — actually increased (from 28 percent to 31 percent) even as it decreased in most of the rest of the nation,” the press release stated. The annual state KIDS COUNT report stressed that state lawmakers should make a priority of addressing the needs of all children by supporting a holistic, coordinated and two-generation approach that serves both children and their families. “We recognize that the data change over one year does not provide a trend, but it is still concerning that some of our worst child wellbeing outcomes continue to decline,” said Veronica C. García, executive director of NM Voices. CART typically evaluates only 20 to 30 children a month, about half of whom ultimately are determined to be victims of abuse, Strickler said. “Although we see fewer patients than many other doctors, we spend a great deal of time with our patients — a minimum of 1 hour, and sometimes much more — and generate lengthy consultative reports and care coordination,” Strickler said. The scarcity of pediatricians who are board-certified in child abuse pediatrics worsens the issue. New Mexico has four child abuse specialists, and CART would like to add a fifth in the next one to two years, she said. “This level of staffing is barely
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Children who are confirmed by child protective services as victims of maltreatment 6,000 5,800 5,600 5,400 5,200 5,000 4,800 4,600 4,400
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• New Mexico is 49th in the nation for overall child wellbeing • Child poverty increased in NM from 26% in 2005 to 29% 2012 • In 2012, there were 41,000 children without health insurance in NM • In 2013, 79% of fourth grade students were not proficient in reading • In 2012, 36% of NM children had parents who lacked secure employment Source: 2014 KIDS COUNT profile, Annie E. Casey Foundation
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Eclectic rocker to NM grads lobby Legislature grace Popejoy Hall Representatives from UNM present projects to lawmakers By Marielle Dent
Courtesy Photo / David James Swanson
Jack White performs at Madison Square Garden in New York City on Jan. 30.
By Matthew Reisen Jack White is coming to Popejoy on Tuesday — arguably the biggest artist the venue has hosted in years — and the people who made it all happen couldn’t be more excited. Student Special Events booked White for a one-night concert in Popejoy Hall, a 2,000-capacity venue, only five days after the artist played a sold-out performance in New York’s Madison Square
Garden, an 18,200-seat auditorium. “It brings Popejoy a whole new audience, it’s not a Broadway show at all,” said Emily Garrity, marketing director for Student Special Events. Tickets went on sale for students the week of fall 2014 finals at $35, and to the public the following week for $58 each, Garrity said. All tickets were sold out on Jan.21.
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Students representing every graduate school in the state advocated for higher education and presented their research and scholarship to lawmakers at the Roundhouse on Friday. The first-time event was coordinated by the New Mexico Council of Graduate Deans, and they intend for Graduate Education Day to become an annual event during the legislative session. Five UNM graduate students representing diverse fields displayed research projects. The Graduate and Professional Students Association representatives were present to further advocate for UNM’s many graduate programs. UNM produces 80 percent of the doctorate degrees and more than half of the graduate degrees in the state, said Julie Coonrod, dean of graduate studies at UNM. This means that opportunities to illustrate the importance of graduate school are a big deal for UNM. “I think this was a great opportunity for UNM graduate
students to come out and showcase the work they’re doing for their studies,” said Texanna Martin, president of UNM’s Graduate and Professional Student Association. “It really helps show that we want to continue being the number-one Ph.D. source in New Mexico.” There is great need, both statewide and nationwide, for more people to obtain higher education degrees. Last year 499 positions requiring advanced education degrees went unfilled in New Mexico and 122,000 of these positions were unfilled nationwide, according to the President of Eastern University, Dr. Steven Gamble. “Unless we become more attentive to this part of our education, New Mexico is going to have a very difficult time moving ahead to the next level of competition in the country, much less around the globe,” Gamble said. “One way to try to make people aware of this is having these kinds of forums, trying to get editorials and trying to testify to important committees.” UNM’s graduate school is a major pipeline to companies around the state that require advanced degrees.
For example, more employees of Los Alamos National Laboratories hold Ph.D.s from UNM than from any other university in the country, said Nancy Ambrosiano, LANL’s public relations officer. The UNM graduate students present at the event displayed work in subjects ranging from nanoscience to architecture. Amber McBride, a postdoctoral fellow, has developed an inhalable chemotherapeutic drug delivery system for lung cancer patients that could increase survival rates and reduce the side effects experienced with current chemotherapies. This form of drug delivery is magnetically responsive and has shown capabilities of targeting specific areas of the lung. Jacqueline Kocer, Ph.D. in Archaeology, has been studying the Gallina people, who lived about 50 miles northeast of Chaco Canyon from 1050-1300 A.D. She has examined the production of these people’s pots and tools and worked to understand if any interaction occurred between them
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