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Students participated in movies, “Monster Mad Libs” game , bingo and tarot readings during the Coleman Hall’s Haunted House Tuesday night. PAGE 3
Junior Allie Hueston fought her way back onto the court after missing the first 14 games of season. PAGE 8
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VOL. 101 | NO. 47 W W W . D A I L YE A S TE R N N E W S . C O M
Art history professor dies at 56
MOLLY DOTSON | THE DAILY EASTERN NE WS
Bailey Kingston, a senior sociology major, shoots at her friends on the opposing team during a game of laser tag during the “Glow Haunted Laser Tag” event in the University Ballroom of the Martin Luther King Jr. University Union. “I’m pretty sweaty and I need my inhaler,” Kingston said after finishing the game.
An art history professor at Eastern died 9:20 a.m. Tuesday morning at BarnesJewish Hospital in St. Louis. Dr. Mary Caroline Simpson The professor, Mary Caroline Simpson, 56, came to Eastern in the fall 2007, university spokesperson Vicki Woodard said. According to the university’s website, along with teaching, Simpson was also the graduate coordinator of the Masters Studio Program. There is a tentative memorial service being planned on campus for later in the week. The story will be updated as more information becomes available
Athletic Workgroup talks data By Cassie Buchman News Editor |@cjbuchman Workgroup no. 4, focusing on intercollegiate athletics, spoke with Jim Davis, the faculty athletics representative for Eastern, about data they could use when researching athletics for the vitalization project. Davis brought up exit interview data conducted with graduating athletes. Exit interviews are conducted through an online survey with all the seniors in three parts, fall summer and spring, and then randomly select half
of these athletes to have a face-to-face interview. During the interview there are three faculty members, one student and someone from the athletic administration present. For the last couple years, Davis said, the comments have not been as positive as they once were. “I would say the last couple of years have been different from my previous experience,” Davis said. However, if the group were to go through the books from past years and interviews, they would find negative comments as well.
Davis called this all “a sign of the times.” “Reduced resources, reduced coaching staffs, reduced training staffs,” Davis said. Year after year, Davis said, facilities have always been an issue that comes up in exit interviews. “If it’s weight room, locker room, whatever, and it’s fairly consistent,” Davis said. “That’s obviously a concern, from my view it’s a safety issue.” He said athletes experiences may have not been what they expected from a Division I institution. Steve Rich, assistant vice president
for advances, said the university needs the resources for facilities and to support student athletes. Chemistry professor Dan Sheeran asked if athletics was staying in budget. Davis said the board reviewed a budget, but most people on the board do not have the expertise to look at or analyze the budget. They do get a report three times a year on progress on the budget. “We try to improve that over time,” Davis said. “We don’t approve the budget, we don’t do anything like that.”
Davis said when it comes to the budget, for athletics, money comes in at different times. “You never know if it’s in the red, there’s money coming you just don’t see that until the end,” Davis said. He said he shows the budget information to faculty senate, and anyone else who wants to see it. Davis said there are underlying issues to cutting sports because of Title 9 regulations. “If we do that, you have to make sure everything is in place, Title 0 compliant,” Davis said. “And you’re losing students at a time we’re already down. That’s a tough decision.” Athletic, page 5
Workgroup looks at recommendations By Cassie Buchman News Editor |@cjbuchman Workgroup no.7 handed in note cards stating their recommendations for the future of academic programs on campus at their meeting Tuesday. On each note card, the members took every program and assigned it a one, recommending it continue with increased resources; a two, recommending the program needs to enhance its marketability; a three to recommend plans to improve its efficiency or a four signifies that a program should be deleted or outsourced. Workgroup chair Cindy Rich, program director of secondary education and foundations, said the group would not be going over the recom-
mendations at meetings; instead, everyone will be split into pairs to compile and put all of the note cards together. These results will go into the preliminary report, which will be sent to the administration. “Hopefully, department chairs get (the report) and they will respond so anything that we’re missing they can tell us ‘Hey, we’re doing this to address our enrollment decline or we’re creating this online program to increase enrollment,’” Rich said. “So when they give us those responses that’s what’s going to go into our final report.” In the report, the group plans to put their majority and minority opinions on what their recommendations are.
Rich said the workgroups have a good mix of faculty and staff who know about academic programs, though she does not know what the recommendations necessarily are. “We know which programs students are looking at. The top majors with higher enrollment are indicative of strong programs, but the liberal arts and gen ed (classes) are very, very important so nobody’s discounting them,” Rich said. Rich said when looking at top majors besides the general studies program, there was kinesiology and sports studies, psychology, communication studies, biological studies, family and consumer sciences, elementary education, management, marketing, sociology and the nursing program. “We’re seeing students that have
a focus in a specific content area but a robust general education program is important to all of us,” Rich said. “Everybody here wants that. Nobody wants that to go away. But you see who is going to EIU and why.” She said some departments have a small number of majors, but can be used for general education student hours. “Because so many people want those classes, there’s no way to get rid of those classes,” she said. Though recommendations for academic programs themselves were not explicitly addressed, business professor Scott Stevens said the comprehensive nature of a liberal arts education made eliminating programs difficult, so he looked at it from a structural standpoint.
“I’m not real happy about it, but one of my recommendations is to eliminate my job,” Stevens said. “If you’re going to be fair, you’re going to be fair.” Stevens, a Unit B faculty member, said he did a labor analysis based on the data he was given, and now believe there are too many part-time, adjuncts Unit B non-tenured faculty on this campus. “They could be eliminated,” Stevens said. “The numbers show that based on the analysis based on student credit hours per faculty member.” Rich said students are needed to fill classes to let faculty do what they need to do. Workgroup No.7, page 5