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VOLUME 66, ISSUE 32
Teachers adjusting to internet technology
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Flags in front of Langsdorf Hall stand at half mast on Tuesday in honor of professor Sheldon Maram.
Family isolation and culture shock are the main concerns of several Middle Eastern students on campus, rather than prejudicial attitudes—contrary to what one might expect considering most news stories coming out of the Middle East. Life in the United States is different from the Middle East, says Ahmed
Heart attack kills professor Cal State Fullerton flags flew at half mast Tuesday in memory of history Professor and long-time faculty member Sheldon (Shelly) Maram who died of a heart attack April 10 at the age of 55 in Fullerton. Family, friends, faculty and students remembered the good and bad times spent in the company of Maram in a ceremony filled with tears and laugther at Harbor Memorial Park, where Maram was laid to rest. “He was very compasionate, caring and nurturing to students,” said history student Robert Hidalgo. “He always gave his students a safe environment where no question was ever a bad question for him.” Maram began his carreer as a history professor at the Instituto Brazil Estados Unidos in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, from 1970 to 1971. He returned to the United States and received his Ph.D. from the University of California, Santa Barbara in 1972. Maram’s doctoral dissertation and lifetime favorite subject was Latin American history. In that same year he served as visiting assistant professor in the Department of History at the University of Kansas. Maram joined the CSUF faculty as assistant professor of history in 1973. “He had high standards for us,” Howard Medrano, another of his students remembers as he looks down to the ground. “He always helped us acheive them, helped us get there with a positive attitude and a strong impact.”
Speak your mind. Be outspoken. Ask questions. Vote. These statements were the tools Maram used to inspire those who signed up Maram for his classes. He encouraged them to be vocal on all subjects and issues they might believe in and he was always interested in what his students had to say. Students remember him as an advocate for many causes, including human rights, labor and immigration. He felt strongly about these issues and was not afraid to speak his mind and express his feelings on them. He always got his message across and encouraged his students to do the same. Maram served as coordinator of the Latin American Studies Program at CSUF for two years during the 1970s and again in 1992, until his sudden death. He also served as coordinator of the Interdisciplinary Studies and the Social Science Programs. History professor Wendy Elliott remembers him as, “Someone dedicated to his causes, the causes that he believed in. He was so proud of his wife, he encouraged her to get her Ph.D. and motivated her towards that goal. He also motivated me to keep pushing for my own goals.” Maram is survived by his wife Linda and his son David; his brothers John and Wesley and sister Leah Maran. “He was a very special person,” said Donald Castro, dean of the School of Humanities and Social Sciences. “One word to describe him would be persis-
Society welcomes women to the workplace n GENDER ISSUE: Society is
more accepting of working women due to the increase in men sharing household responsibilities. By JASON M. TAYLOR Daily Titan Staff Writer
When Lisa Bergman Hughes applied to law school some 20-odd years ago, the dean of her school asked her if she was there to get married. Today, a question like that is an actionable offense. Hughes, today an Orange County attorney and a candidate for the U. S. Congress, spoke as part of the Sociology Student Association’s Sociology Day. She said since those days she has seen n for more sociology news,
please see page 3
things change enormously. “I think God made me a girl on purpose so I would have better stories,” said Hughes to a crowd of about 120 in the Titan Student Union’s Portola Pavilion. She has seen women enter the workforce more and more, replacing the men who cursed at her for wearing dresses. This change—society’s acceptance of working women—has been accompanied by an increase in men sharing household responsibilities, lecturers said at the evening session. But on several fronts, the conventional view that changing attitudes were responsible for this acceptance was challenged. One such conventional view is that women went to work and men stayed home, after wholesale changes in public views on gender roles made it possible. But Scott Coltrane, a UC Riverside family sociology professor, suggested that the trend of men lending a hand in house-
work and child-rearing has come less from an initial ideological shift, but rather out of sheer necessity. There is a certain minimum number of hours a day needed to take care of children, Coltrane said, and as women have spent less time at home and more at work, men have had to cover those hours. He said those experiences, at least in part, may actually have led to shifts in men’s ideas. “You open your heart,” he said, referring to the experience of child-rearing. “Men are unlikely to put themselves in positions of vulnerability,” he said, but having to be responsible for childrens’ needs helps men be more emotional. Hughes said shifts in male attitudes are helping to accelerate the inclusion of women in the workforce. “I think the men of our society will make the difference,” Hughes said. “Because they’re raising their daughters to be equals.”
their family and friends. When they come here they’re by themselves, in an apartment. So it’s hard.” What has made it easier for him, AlJasem says, was living in Pasadena from the ages of five to 11 years old, during the time his father worked here. Yet, he says he still finds comfort in being able to socialize with a large local population of other Middle Eastern students, also here to attend American universities. “It’s just like anyone,” Al-Jasem says. “Say you’re from a midwest state and you move here. You’re all alone. For Kuwaiti people, when they come here they usually know someone in the area and they take care of them,” Al-Jasem added. According to the campus’ Office of
Statistical Analysis, 61 non-resident students from the Middle East attend classes at Cal State Fullerton. Some, like Husain Jumaan, a Yemeni marketing major at CSUF since 1992, may face further difficulties when they return to their homeland. “It was very difficult for me to go back. To the different routine of life, to their understanding,” Jumaan says about a recent visit to his family and homeland. “It took me a couple of weeks to get back to their understanding of life. “A lot of my friends go through the same thing,” Jumaan added, explaining that a feeling of disorientation is common for students who come from the Middle East. “It takes at least a couple
Adjustment of concern to Arab students Daily Titan Staff Writer
APRIL 16, 1998
Daily Titan Staff Writer
Daily Titan Staff Writer
By FRANK C. DIAZ
See page 4
By Edgard Aguilar
By CINDY JIMENEZ
the Middle East attending CSUF say they are more preoccupied with culture shock than stereotypes of their people.
Is Ewan MacGregor back on heroin?
remember professor for his good work.
Grants will enable students to access classroom materials throughout the web by the summer.
n MINORITIES: Students from
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n OBITUARY: Students
n TECHNOLOGY :
Delivery of course material to students via the World Wide Web will be readily available after faculty learn how to drive the Information Superhighway. Twenty $1,500 technology grants are offered this summer for full-time tenure-track faculty to assist them in the preparation and development of instructional material. “We have seen that there is a growing faculty interest in the Web and we are hoping the program this summer will meet their needs,” said Ellen Junn, director of the Faculty Development Center sponsoring the training program. The Faculty Technology Support Programs will focus mainly on helping faculty use the WebCT, an easy-touse system developed at the University of British Colmbia. The tool is utilized by non-technical faculty for converting instructional material or developing new Web-based learning material for students to access. “We will help faculty to use our new technology infrastructure for what faculty do—instruction, research and service,” Acting Academic Technology Coordinator Sorel Reisman said. There is a large number of faculty who want to use the Web but do not know how. “I get calls all the time” from faculty who are interested in learning, he said. The WebCT will provide delivery of instruction, online testing and studentto-student or student-to-instructor online collaboration. Junn said one of the main purposes of faculty going online with course information is to supplement and augment classroom instruction, not replace it. She said the FDC wants to get feedback from students to assess their needs as faculty develop programs to better serve them online. “The WebCT can ask questions and answer questions put forth by students,”Reisman said. The WebCT system allows instructors to build instructional material that students can interact with. The summer-long training will start after faculty receive new computer stations by June, Reisman said. Faculty will have an accessible training technology staff during the summer to instruct them in programming. Crossdisciplines on campus will enable faculty to share fresh ideas about teaching on the Web, Junn said.
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Seiraf, president of the Arab Student Union. Although born in this country, he explains that living alone here, isolated from family, can be strenuous on someone from the Arab world. “Like most minorities, family is an extremely important priority,” Seiraf says. “People live in the family at home generation after generation. It’s the number one priority whether it’s business or a private social life.” Fahad Al-Jasem, an electrical engineering major from Kuwait who plans on returning to his home country after he earns his degree, agrees with the isolation felt by many Arab students. “They have to feel displaced at first because it’s a different way of living,” Al-Jasem says. “They used to live with
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She added that if boys are raised by men who view male and female children equally, they will become less interested in being “macho,” as well. Lecturers also discussed how, like any major social change, the increase in female workers has had both positive and negative effects—the latter of which tends to be ignored in popular media. Though women have gained more freedom and independence, it may lead to extra stresses on marriages. In addition, as nearly 60 percent of women with preschool-age children are working during the day, Coltrane said, daycare centers have become increasingly necessary in child-rearing. Coltrane’s lecture also touched on single motherhood, a phenomenon generally attributed to teenage pregnancy. Coltrane’s information suggested that the greatest increase in single motherhood actually has come in the 30 years and
older category; women who have the resources to support a child and make the conscious choice to be mothers. Tuesday’s event was the third annual and was funded by the Departmental Associations Council and organized by the SSA. Vicki Hodge, the club’s president, said the purpose of Sociology Day was to “bring sociology to the forefront.” She said Sociology Day was especially designed to give students exposure to new ideas and perspectives on research. Hughes, who also spent a significant part of her lecture time discussing her political platform as it related to the issues at hand, brought a unique perspective of her own to the discussion as potentially one of the first female Republican representatives to Congress. “I don’t want to be first,” she said. “I don’t want to be the one to break the ground.”
FRANK DIAZ/Daily Titan
Fahad Al-Jasem, an electrial engineering student from Kuwait and Ahmed Seirafi, president of the Arab Student Union, chat during the recent Arab/ Middle East Week Mini-Bazaar.