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EL CAMINO COLLEGE
October 11, 2012
Forensics team starts strong with first tournament win Kyle Mounce Staff Writer
At the California Double-Up tournament at Azusa Pacific University this past weekend, ECC’s Forensics debate team took first place in debate and second place overall, Francesca Bishop, director of forensics, said. twenty-six schools competed at the tournament, with each school arranging its students in teams of two to compete in individual events, Bishop said. “An amazing performance,” Bishop said, “It was a really great tournament, really good start of the year for us.” There were 10 two-person debate teams from EC competing in different events and eight of them advancing to elimination rounds with several taking gold,
Torrance, California
Posture, poise, perfection
Bishop said. “We put people together based on their experience level, their availability, their success, and their commitment,” Bishop said. This was the first “real debate tournament” that the forensics team has competed in this semester, although there was a tournament that was more like a “scrimmage” against other schools, from Sept. 29-30 here at EC, Bishop said. The debates were parliamentary and all of the topics were based on subjects that were discussed at the recent presidential debate. “We debated financing and all of the domestic issues like Medicare and health care,” Bishop said. The team’s success at the Double-Up tournament may put the EC debate team at
the top of the leaderboard for the National Parliamentary Debate Association (NPDA) sweepstakes, Bishop said. “We’re really proud of our novice team, all of them made it to the elimination round,” Janine Douglass, vice president of individual events, said. The NPDA is the largest national intercollegiate debate organization in the U.S., with between 200 and 250 schools attending at least one tournament during the course of the year, according to parlidebate.org. The forensics team has an outstanding reputation and consistently wins championships at every level of competition and earns top ranks from the NPDA according to elcamino.edu. “We are going to have a good year,” Bishop said. “We have got very talented students.”
have the advantage of completing their degree in less time and with less money. “It is going to give them some benefits in terms of admission to CSU. One of the main advantages that they will have is that when they transfer with this associate for transfer degree, they are guaranteed to complete their bachelor’s degree at the university in 60 units,” Oda-Omori said. Furthermore, Oda-Omori said that under this law, students can increase their chances of admission to a university even if they do not meet the grade requirement in the traditional transfer process. “For some students, depending on where they are applying to, they will get an extra bump of 0.1 to 0.2 in their grade point average for admissions,” she said. Margarita Gonzalez, counselor, said that once students signed the AA-T/ AS-T agreement with their counselor they will
be eligible for the benefits of this law. “Students who are taking these degrees are prioritized over students with Transfer Agreement Guarantee (TAG),” Gonzalez said. “The chances (of admission) can be limited if students do not sign the agreement and complete their program.” Aside from that, Oda-Omori said despite the halt in spring 2013 admission, the CSU system has opened their doors to nine EC students who had completed AA-T or AS-T. Currently, EC is offering Psychology, Geology and Sociology majors for the AS-T and a Communications Studies major for AA-T, Lori Suekawa, articulation officer, said. “We are expecting to have more degree majors available soon. They are in the process of being developed and approved by their respective divisions,” Suekawa said.
New website offers transfer advice Angela Songco Staff Writer
In order to help guide students through today’s complicated transfer process, the California Community Colleges (CCC) and CSU system launched a new website last week. The website, “ADegreeWithAGuarantee.com,” was designed to provide information with regard to what degrees are guaranteed transfers to CSU. It also explains what community colleges are approved to offer them, as well as the transfer process and procedures applicable for these degrees in connection to the Student Transfer Achievement Reform Act, or the State Senate Bill 1440 that was signed into legislation in 2010. Sue Oda-Omori, transfer counselor, said that this law stated that students who are completing an “Associate Degree for Transfer (AA-T/AS-T)” will
Kyle Borden/ Union
Scarlett Hubbard, 22, dance major, stretches before her ballet class in the Physical Education South building on Sept. 27.
League of Women Voters to give informational presentation on November ballot propositions Karly Daquila Staff Writer
Information on upcoming ballot propositions will be provided Oct. 23 at noon by the League of Women Voters (LWV) to inform students and faculty the power of a yes or no vote come election day. Occurring in Haag recital hall, and sponsored by the political science depart-
ment, the League of Women Voters will be providing an unbiased panel discussion to educate voters on the pros and cons of ballot measures, Athena Corimer, LWV Torrance Association president said. Discussions will be had by three or four representatives, who will go over all 11 ballot propositions, including what they promise to do, what the cost to the voters will be and who supports them, Jackie La Bouff,
LWV Torrance Association voter service director said. If voters are curious of the motivation behind the ballot measure or proposition it is good to “follow the money”. The top donators or funders of each ballot measure, which are often eye opening, are good sources to observe when researching your vote, Corimer said. The LWV owns and operates Smart-
Voter.org which is an unbiased and reliable source for ballot information, including bios of candidates, proposition and measure pro’s and cons and voting basics, Le Bouff said. “The League of Women Voters is restricted on what is discussed, we never discuss anything that is partisan, we simply educate the populous about the non-partisan issues,” La Bouff said.
In addition to workshops, the LWV will release voter education publications to the EC library, in order to guide students prior to election day, Lance Widman, political science professor, said. “The whole process and privilege of voting is everyone’s responsibility. People need to get educated so that they can determine for themselves what position they will be taking on these issues,” La Bouff said.
Computer server move could cause further outages in student information system Elizabeth Aviles Staff Writer
NEWS LINE
Following an air-conditioning failure that resulted in a 33 hour school-wide system crash on Sept. 26, EC is moving its computer servers to a new facility, campus officials said. John Wagstaff, director of information technology services, said that plans to move the system to a new facility containing new equipment were set in place before the crash occurred. “The equipment was at the end of its warranty.” Wagstaff said. “The data center is moving to a brand new facility. We will be expecting an additional redundancy in
By Monique Judge
the air-conditioning system,” Wagstaff added. Parts of the system will begin to be taken to the new facility on Nov. 26. This move could potentially cause system outages, Wagstaff said. “We have a week, five days in which we can try to get it all done but it may take longer, Wagstaff said. “The campus community will know well in advance what is happening.” Hortense Cooper, director of financial aid, stated that the financial aid services will be “working around it,” and that the office will be scheduling around the system migration to the new facility. “We understand the absolute importance of keeping the website up and keeping the portal up and mak-
ing sure that students can get at the information and services they need,” Wagstaff said. The school’s Ellucian (computer) System crashed without warning at approximately 3:20 p.m. on Sept. 26, causing a complete shut down of all student services. A moderately new “chilled water system” failed to cool down data center equipment, which had reached temperatures exceeding one hundred degrees, Wagstaff said. Fearing heat damage, three technicians were left with no other choice than to shut down the vital system. While the network itself was restored after three hours, reviving the college’s phone systems, the actual student information system remained down.
“It was a total meltdown,” Wagstaff said. In their efforts to restore the broken systems, Wagstaff said that the financial system had been compromised. He also made clear the student information system heavily relies on the financial systems. “We actually had to ask Ellucian (company that designed the system) for help. They got in there with us and had us running some programs, some of these runs took about two or three hours. We couldn’t bring back Colleague (The student information system) until it was fixed,” Wagstaff said. System crashes occasionally happen, but typically last under 20 minutes, “sometimes an hour or two,”
Steven Waterhouse, supervisor of admissions and records, said. “This is the only time that it’s
gone off for a couple of days,” Waterhouse added
Transfer services schedule Cal Poly tour
FBI agent to speak on campus next week
Transfer workshop to inform on Universities
UC Personal Statements workshop
USC Bus Tour scheduled by transfer services
Transfer Services has organized a bus trip to California State Polytechnic University, Pomona on Saturday Oct. 20. Students will be able to learn about admissions requirements, financial aid and more. Students must register and pay a $5 refundable deposit in order to attend.
FBI Special Agent Judith Gelman will be speaking with students interested in careers with the FBI on Tuesday from 11:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. in SSC 218. All students are welcome to attend. For more information, contact the Career Center at 310-660-3593, ext. 6137
The Transfer Center has scheduled a workshop for Tuesday from 1 to 2 p.m. in Humanities 103. Information will be given on finding out about universities that offer major and CSU and UC transferable courses. For more information, contact Transfer Services at -310-660-3593 ext. 3408
Students planning to apply to the University of California system are encouraged to attend the UC Personal Statement Workshop scheduled on Thursday from 1 to 2 p.m. in MCS 100A. For more information, contact Transfer Services at -310-660-3593 ext. 3408
The University of Southern California will be having its fall transfer day on Friday, Oct. 26. Transfer Services has arranged a bus tour to USC on that day, and interested students are encouraged to register early by signing up in the Transfer Center and paying the refundable $5 deposit.
Photo Illustration by Philip Prins