Daily Egyptian

Page 1

Daily Egyptian THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 5, 2015

VOL. 100 ISSUE 12

SINCE 1916

DAILYEGYPTIAN.COM

Black Male Roundtable marches for equality SHANNON ALLEN @SHANNONALLEN_DE

The Black Lives Matter campaign has become a popular and controversial topic on the Internet. However, the campaign will not create the change people of color in America are seeking, according to Michael Smith, president of the Registered Student Organization Black Male Roundtable. Smith, a junior from Chicago studying political science, led a student march Wednesday from Lawson Hall to the Student Center to speak out against injustices black students experience at the university. The RSO works to give black male students a chance to voice their opinions and interact with other black males, Smith said. The organization’s goal for the march was to address the divide it sees in the black student population and to inform students of university policies that hinder black organizations, such as the large scale event policy. The policy, created by former SIUC Chancellor Rita Cheng in 2012, restricts RSO events to venues with a maximum capacity of 850 people. When the policy was enacted, Kappa Alpha Psi and Alpha Phi Alpha were the only two organizations hosting events that had more than 850 attendees. “These happen to be two black

TJ Price | @TJPrice_DE Michael Smith, Junior from Chicago, leads the “100 Black Men” march to from the Student Center with The Black Male Roundtable on Wednesday in front of Morris Library.

Greek letter organizations, and they were responsible for hosting the largest events at the SIU Arena,” Smith said. “I am black unapologetically. I am

Friends, colleagues to host memorial for SIUC student BILL LUKITSCH | @BILL_LUKITSCHDE

A memorial service for Fiyinfoluwa Onarinde, a 31-year-old doctoral candidate from Nigeria who died last month, is scheduled for 5:30 p.m. Thursday at Calvary Campus Church. Onarinde was found dead in his apartment on the 500 block of South Logan Street on Oct. 22, according to police. The cause of death is uncertain, but foul play is not suspected, police said. Onarinde began coursework toward a Ph.D in English at the university this fall, according to university spokesperson Rae Goldsmith. The service was organized by a few of his colleagues from the English department. Robert Fox, a professor of English at the university, knew Onarinde through his continental literature class. Onarinde was also his teaching assistant. “I felt I had a bit more of a connection with him than a typical student because of the link with my wife’s home country,” Fox said. Fox described Onarinde as a bright and modest young man and called his death a tragic loss. Onarinde received a bachelors degree in English from Osun State Polytechnic, and a masters degree in communication from the University of Adoekiti, both in Nigeria before moving to the U.S. on a Fulbright scholarship to teach Yoruba — his native language — at SIU-Edwardsville in 2014. “He just had a kind soul,” said Cheryl Lombard, who had met Onarinde through an international student-exchange program while he was teaching at SIUE. “[My husband and I] were shocked and saddened greatly.”

@DAILYEGYPTIAN

black. What do they expect of me? They want me to fall, they want me to fail, but with my brothers behind me, I will prevail,” the group chanted as they moved through campus.

Smith said he was told the march scared the administration. “Apparently, every time a group of black people get together, something bad is bound to happen

because supposedly, we’re angry at something,” Smith said to the crowd. “But guess what? We are. I’m pissed at the administration.” Please see MARCH | 3

Free online textbooks promise to save students cash CORY RAY | @coryray_DE

Students may not need to pay for textbooks in the near future. K. V. Shajesh, a physics lecturer at SIUC, plans to use a free online textbook service for his Physics 203a course in spring semester. The development of free online textbooks is not completely new, said Leo Silbert, a professor of physics at the university. Shajesh and Silbert initially discovered the website OpenStax College, which offers free online college-level textbooks, via email. Silbert said they looked through material in a textbook on the site and decided it offered an appropriate level of material for the algebra-based college physics courses. “The information you get from the books is completely equivalent to current textbooks,” Silbert said. “In my mind, there’s no difference. They’re not watered down; they’re just at the same level. They’re basically a real textbook for free.” OpenStax College began in 2012 as an initiative by Rice University and was partially funded through the Bill Gates Foundation. The website features 19 textbooks free to the public about everything from biology

to history to pre-calculus. The textbooks have been adopted by several institutions including SIUEdwardsville, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Pennsylvania State University and Princeton. Shajesh plans to integrate the free online physics book along with the usual assigned text for his class, but said he will predominantly focus on the online version. Despite its advantages, Shajesh admitted the virtual textbook is not exempt from flaws. “It may not perfect. Every textbook has its issues,” Shajesh said. “This textbook will have its issues, but it’s as good as the existing textbooks and it’s free.” After learning of the resource, Silbert proposed using OpenStax College for inclass textbooks to the undergraduate physics committee, of which he is a member. “As far as I know, we’re the only people [at the university] talking about this kind of thing,” Silbert said. Silbert has polled students in physics classes to gauge their interest in switching from physical to digital copies since discovering the website. His data indicated

students prefer physical copies of books to online versions, but are willing to use free online textbooks instead of expensive physical copies. Chase Campanella, a junior from DuQuoin studying physiology and enrolled in Physics 203a, agrees with the majority of Silbert’s findings. “I’ve always liked the hard textbooks, but I don’t see any problems with an online textbook,” Campanella said. “Obviously, the free choice is usually the best choice.” Similar to private vendors, OpenStax College provides lecture notes and slides as well as solution manuals for both students and professors. OpenStax has a common license, meaning books can be updated, redistributed and edited by users as long proper citations are made. Ultimately, using the open resource is up to the course instructor who, like Shajesh, choose their class books. “The cost of textbooks is pretty outrageous,” Silbert said. “I’m all for trying to bring down those costs and if something appropriate comes out like this new textbook, I’m all for it.”


Turn static files into dynamic content formats.

Create a flipbook
Issuu converts static files into: digital portfolios, online yearbooks, online catalogs, digital photo albums and more. Sign up and create your flipbook.
Daily Egyptian by Daily Egyptian - Issuu