THIRD TIME NOT THE CHARM
ON THE PROWL
The Eastern football team fell to Illinois State Saturday to start its season 0-3.
Student Senate has renamed and revamped Pizza with the Prez, which is a monthly opportunity for students to talk to President Bill Perry.
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Dai ly Eastern News
THE
W W W .D A I L YE A S TE R N N E W S. C O M
Monday, Sept. 15, 2014
“TELL THE TRUTH AND DON’T BE AFRAID”
VOL. 99 | NO. 16
Greek Life numbers projected to decline By Samantha Middendorf Entertainment Editor | @Samantha_EE Eastern’s dropping enrollment is expected to affect Greek enrollment for the year. Greek life has experienced several issues because of the decline in enrollment. Dean Harwood, director of fraternity and sorority programs, said in the fall of 2013, there were 1,557 fraternity and sorority members on campus. “As of right now, we are projecting that we will have about 1,450 to 1,500 students as fraternity and sorority members this fall,” Harwood said. The amount of women registered for fall 2014 recruitment is less than what it has been in the past. “There is a slight decrease in the number of women registered for sorority recruitment this year, although the numbers are very close to those of the past two years,” Harwood said. Eastern’s campus is comprised of nine sororities and 11 fraternities. Alpha Gamma Delta, Alpha Phi, Alpha Sigma Alpha, Alpha Sigma Tau, Delta Delta Delta, Delta Zeta, Kappa Delta, Sigma Kappa and Sigma Sigma Sigma are the nine sororities on campus.
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CHYNNA MILLER| THE DAILY EASTERN NE WS
Rush candidates walk through the Library Quad after recieving their bids for Fall Recruitment 2014 Sunday. Less women registered this semester than in the past.
CUPB reviews purchasing process, committee positions By Debby Hernandez Administration Editor | @DEN_News The Council on University Planning and Budget reviewed issues on the university’s purchasing process and elected members to serve in the council committees Friday. Paul McCann, the interim vice president for business affairs, delivered information on problems with the university procurement process as a result of new regulations. Illinois Senate Bill 51, which took effect in 2010, made changes to the procurement code for higher education, adding regulations and restricting the way universities contract with groups. Illinois House Bill 5491 was passed in
August and will take effect in January 2015. One provision of HB 5491 limits what third party providers are acceptable, according to bill synopsis. McCann said the bill has further complicated Eastern’s purchasing process, in particular with the local group called Midwestern Higher Education Compact. “We have probably 20 years or so been a member of that, and have been able to purchase things such as property insurance, computers and student insurance through that group,” he said. He said the group has allowed them to buy off contracts that are negotiable. McCann said the problem continues with restrictions from the Chief Procurement
Officer. “The CPO is attempting to limit our ability to access that group along other multi-state purchasing organizations,” he said. “If restricted, our costs will go up.” Efforts to resolve the problem will continue to be made, he said. The CUPB also elected members to serve on its committees, including David Emmerich as the new council chair, replacing Allen Lanham. Under the executive committee, six other members were chosen including Grant Sterling representing academic affairs, Pamela Naragon for student affairs, Jonathan McKenzie for university advancement, Jack Cruikshank as the student representa-
tive, Kathlene Shank as the dean representative, and Christine Edwards representing the council at large. The budget transfer committee now consists of five people with Gloria Leitschuh, Steven Daniels, Melissa Gordon, Timothy Zimmer and Lynette Drake as members. Three members were also elected to serve in each of the five subcommittees, which are president’s area, business affairs, university advancement, academic affairs and student advancement. Debby Hernandez can be reached at 581-2812 or dhernandez5@eiu.edu
Faculty studies minority data from focus groups Roberto Hodge Multicultural Editor |@BertoHodge
Student-run focus groups within the Making Excellence Inclusive forum are searching for a company to transcribe data from studies about diversity and inclusion on campus. Once the data is transcribed, faculty members from many of the departments within the College of Arts and Humanities will analyze it in order to combat some of the issues facing minorities. Richard Jones Jr., assistant professor of communication studies, and Linda Scholz, associate professor of communication studies, oversees the focus groups. The groups help those in Making Excellence Inclusive, which is a forum created in order for faculty members to meet once a month and have an open-ended discussion about avoiding stereotyping and typecasting.
Ruben Quesada, assistant professor of English, said the focus group’s overall goal is to help the Making Excellence Inclusive forum with determining needs and opportunities when it comes to matters of race, gender, sexual orientation and the overall culture of Eastern. “MEI’s focus is on diversity, inclusion and equality,” Quesada said, “In order to fully understand how these areas need to be addressed at Eastern, we need to directly hear from students.” Focus groups were held in the spring of 2014 about what students deal with in the classroom, on campus and in the overall Charleston community. Even though Making Excellence Inclusive has the data, much of it needs to be transcribed, and they are in the process of finding organizations and companies to do that. “The professors who set up the focus groups don’t have the resources to make the transcriptions and the university doesn’t
have the resources to pay someone to do it,” Quesada said. “So the information is simply sitting there.” Quesada said the forum is working on informing the Eastern-Charleston community that they are inclusive and all forms of diversity are important. He said the group wants to promote an environment that has dignity and respect for everyone, which is why Quesada made a video of students and faculty from all backgrounds addressing issues related to inclusiveness and diversity. “There is nothing wrong with acknowledging that someone is black, Latino, Asian, man or woman, gay or lesbian, of varying physically or mentally capacity,” Quesada said. “It starts by creating physical space and resources to better understand the experiences of all these people.” Students should also know that coming to college will challenge them in many different ways and they should rise to such a
challenge and prove to themselves and the community that they are ready to succeed no matter what, Quesada said. Quesada said these discussions are important because they will allow faculty to begin thinking about how they treat their students and become more sensitive to how peers treat them as well. He said the talks should make ever yone aware of how they treat one another especially if they are from different backgrounds. “I understand that historically this has been an institution with white, middle class students, but higher education is becoming less homogenous and we need to accommodate for that change if we’re to survive,” Quesada said. Roberto Hodge can be reached at 581-2812 or rlhodge@eiu.edu.