Vanguard 88||News News February Month Day, 26, 12, 2009 2010
News Editor: Virginia Vickery 503-725-5690 news@dailyvanguard.com
Vote for Portland State’s next SALPie Portland State’s Student Activities and Leadership Programs will host the annual SALPie Award ceremony on June 2. However, award nominations are being accepted until May 14. The SALPies recognize the work and contribution of student leaders and recognized SALP student organizations and services, according to the SALP Web site. The awards will include recognition for the “Event of the Year,” “Student Group of the Year” and “Student Leader of the Year.” Students can turn in numerous nomination forms at this point in time.
NEWS Reclaiming the underground
University considering a remodel of the SMSU subbasement Courtney Graham Vanguard staff
Recent rumors—confirmed in part by Mark Russell, Smith Memorial Student Union general manager—circulating in student government indicate that the Smith Advisory Board is considering asking for funds to start a remodel of the building’s subbasement, which currently houses Portland State’s student media. Such a remodel would rework the space already occupied by student media, and “would include recarpeting, upgrading the lighting and generally improving the aesthetic quality of the space,” Russell said in an e-mail. “There may also be a redrawing of the floor plan so as to enlarge or shrink certain office spaces,” he added, “or to carve out a common office area where student groups could collaborate and store materials.” Any renovations that would
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require reductions in office space to create such a common space would be subject to further approval by the Advisory Board and the Smith Space Allocation Committee, according to Russell. Furthermore, the funds to accomplish such a project depend on the amount received from the Student Building Fee, but a number has not yet been handed down. The SBF is a fee collected from tuition each term at every university in the Oregon University System. This fee is then pooled statewide, and the balance is used by the organization to pay down “taxexempt municipal bonds,” according to a video on the OUS capital construction Web site. These municipal bonds are then used to fund capital projects at Oregon universities, where the various student government associations recommend which projects the money will be used for. In this case, the Smith Advisory Board will make its own recommendations after a timeline for SBF allocations is determined. While the present plans are only to consider changes in the studentoccupied section of the subbasement
space, a glance at the university floor plan shows that though it is not the only open area on that level, it is the only accessible one. A large part of the floor plan shows no public access, and is part of an area that houses University storage, among other things, Russell said. That area, however, encompasses nearly half of the entire space in the sub-basement. According to Facilities and Planning’s “Building Area Inventory,” of the gross area square footage in the SMSU there are roughly 69,000 unused square feet of space. Much of this space is most likely unusable—due to coding restrictions or necessary empty spaces in certain areas—for anything but what it is now being used by the university. However, there may be a benefit to advocating for some storage space reclamation for the use and benefit of student groups who populate SMSU. “The most pressing need that I see from student groups is for storage,” said Aimee Shattuck, director of Student Activities and Leadership Programs, in an e-mail. For its part, the university is making a sweeping effort to
update problematic and outmoded infrastructure, and to create new space as enrollment continues to grow every year. Most recently, such projects have included the new student recreation center and the ongoing renovations of Lincoln Hall, and will include the Oregon Sustainability Center in the future. According to the Campus Physical Planning Committee’s “University District Master Plan Needs Analysis” a report from 2006, one underlying goal of such infrastructure changes is to “encourage interaction and reflect campus community diversity” throughout the physical campus. Currently, PSU is also seeking to expand with a “network of partners in Portland, the Pacific Northwest and increasingly the world,” according to the “Provost’s Welcome” portion of the Portland State Portfolio, which outlines a vision for the university. According to the welcome message, the wish of PSU to be a state university at the forefront of sustainability, research and global partnerships is a large part of what drives major infrastructure projects. If PSU is to remain competitive, they need to make certain outward changes to their capital façade.
Visit www.orgsync. com/forms/show/18480 to submit an award nomination. —salp.pdx.edu
All photos by Adam Wickham/Portland State Vanguard
Mark Russell: General manager reigning in big ideas for the SMSU subbasement.
OHSU |
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Integration an idea, but more work needed “There’s a potential to make the [graduate program process] simpler,” Pilliod said. “For example, we can make it easier for doctoral or Ph.D. students to transfer their credits from PSU to OHSU instead of having to go through two academic review boards in both schools.” One of the challenges in creating a joint academic program between the two universities is determining the tuition rate, as the two universities have different funding systems. PSU relies more on state support than OHSU and, on average, OHSU students pay more for tuition than PSU students. Green wondered whether a student taking a joint program will pay OHSU tuition rates or PSU rates. “Tuition is one of the problems,” Koch said. “For the joint MBA in health care program, the tuition was set at a rate that is not as high as an OHSU program but higher than a PSU program, so it’s somewhere in between.” According to the program’s Web site, students in the program pay $525 per credit for a total of $40,000 upon completion.
Koch said PSU also has another joint graduate program with OHSU in systems science, in which a student can complete three years of study at PSU and two years at OHSU and receive a Bachelor of Science degree in computer science from PSU and a Master of Science degree in bioinformatics from OHSU. “There may be a potential for more shared or joint programs, but we need to work out the tuition issue,” Koch said. Pilliod said successful collaboration will also be needed to preserve each institution’s identity. “Branding is a big issue, because the two universities have very strong and unique missions,” Pilliod said. “PSU has a strong stakehold in the city, it’s seen as an access point, the student body is much larger and different than OHSU. We want to make sure that what’s coming out of that is a stronger brand than each of its parts individually.” Green said the task force is working to deliver their report on the potential for closer collaboration with OHSU to the president of the two universities in June.
Current PSU and OHSU partnerships Portland Research and Education Network: A high-speed, metropolitan-area network connecting the universities to the national research network, Internet2. Public Safety: PSU’s Campus Public Safety Office and the OHSU security office have a pending mutual-aid pact to provide backup support for each other. South Waterfront Life Sciences Complex: An estimated $200 million project that, upon completion, will house bioscience research and instructional facilities for five universities with PSU and OHSU as leading partners. MBA in health care: Offering in-person and online-learning, the three-year program requires students to establish residencies at OHSU. Master of Public Health: A joint program between PSU, OHSU and Oregon State University, students can take courses in any of the three campuses, ranked second in the nation for community health by U.S. News & World Report in 2003. System Science Graduate Program: Students can receive a Bachelor of Science degree in computer science from PSU and a Master of Science degree in bioinformatics from OHSU after five years.