We spiced things up. The Ithacan has a revamped website. Cleaner look. More great coverage.
The Ithacan online at theithacan.org
The Ithacan Thursday, Sep tember 29, 20 11
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Volume 79, Is s u e 5
IC awarded $1.2 million science grant
Dorm-to-dorm salesmen
by candace king contributing writer
Students bridge the market between big brands and colleges
to us developing a registry of authors and publishers who can be found as well as ones who can’t. That would be useful to everyone.” Courant said he would like orphan works to be made more available to other universities. “We would like orphan works to be as usable as possible, or to the benefit of our students, our faculty and scholarship more generally,” he said. He said the lawsuit is not asking for money. The HathiTrust Orphan Works
The National Science Foundation has awarded a $1.2 million grant to Ithaca College to encourage students to pursue teaching careers in science, technology, engineering and math. The grant, which is funded through the Robert Noyce Teaching Scholarship Program within the Division of Undergraduate Education of NSF, will support 18 undergraduate students interested in those fields. Jeane Copenhaver- Johnson, associate profes- COPENHAVERsor and chair of JOHNSON said the the Department of grant will improve Education, said the teaching quality. grant will establish a firm foundation for interested and enthusiastic STEM students who are unaware of the potential rewards of a teaching career. "[What] this can do for Ithaca College students is provide not only a really wonderful preparation for teaching, but also open that field up to students who have not considered that as a professional possibility for them," she said. The NSF grant will help the Robert Noyce Scholarship Program run by the college address and remedy a shortage of quality STEM teachers, which are projected to plummet by 2015. More than 270,000 secondary school teachers are needed, according to a Business-Higher Education Forum report. Joan Prival, lead program director of the Robert Noyce Scholarship Program, said the grant is meant to improve the quality of teachers across the country. The college is one of 53 schools that have been awarded the grant. NSF received about 145 proposals. Prival said the college's eligibility for the grant was determined by two major criteria: intellectual merit and broader impact. Prival said there is a national need for teachers to maintain a strong science and mathematics enterprise to combat issues such as energy consumption. Michael Rogers, associate professor
See lawsuit, page 4
See grant, page 4
Photo Illustration by Michelle Boulé
by nicole ogrysko staff writer
Sophomore Jen Segal’s room looks like almost any other dorm at Ithaca College — a few posters on the wall, a desk neatly organized in the corner and cheetah print sheets. But underneath her bed looks a little different. Segal unpacks a large box stuffed with blue, lime green and neon orange drawstring bags, each with a “Microsoft U” logo on the front. Out comes another box, this time packed with dozens of red Campusfood plastic cups, pens and bumper stickers. A new laptop sits on her desk. The Microsoft tent, which is taller than Segal, is crammed in the back behind the boxes. Segal works as a brand ambassador, a student
representative for companies like Cash4Books. net, the Princeton Review and Campusfood. com. She markets products from these companies directly to students on campus. In return, she, like most student representatives, receives competitive pay, hands-on marketing experience and free merchandise. The effort is one of the latest marketing techniques that large corporations are using to reach a younger demographic. “The concept itself is really selling itself,” Segal said. “It’s a great way for companies to use people who know their school and know their audience.” Segal is the president of a group of interns and ambassadors at the college for Campusfood. com, for which she organizes campus events and hands out free coupons and merchandise.
This semester, Segal is also working as a college ambassador for Microsoft, an effort which she said she expects will be a challenge to market at the college. “This is an Apple campus, essentially, and it’s going to be a project,” she said. Segal said she was introduced to the ambassador idea when a classmate spoke about her experience during her Introduction to Strategic Communication class. After researching several ambassador programs, she decided to contact companies that specifically targeted college students. Michael McCall, marketing professor at the college, said firms choose students to market
See brand, page 4
Cornell University faces library digitization lawsuit by jack curran contributing writer
Cornell University is being sued for copyright infringement by several authors and authors’ groups who are alleging that the university's partnered library digitization project is illegal. Cornell, along with four other universities, is part of HathiTrust, a partnership of libraries and research institutions that digitize libraries. HathiTrust recently created the Orphan Works Project, which will allow authorized users at partner institutions to access orphan works,
which are copyrighted materials whose copyright holders cannot be located. The Authors Guild, the Australian Society of Authors, the Québec Union of Writers and eight individual authors filed a copyright infringement lawsuit against the digital library website, HathiTrust, Cornell University, the University of Michigan, the University of California, the University of Wisconsin and Indiana University on Sept. 15. HathiTrust has allegedly digitized about seven million books illegally, according to the lawsuit.
rough tides Crews adjust to rowing on the lake and using a temporary boathouse, page 19
Cornell Deputy Spokesman Simeon Moss declined to comment. He said it is too soon to know what Cornell plans to do about the lawsuit. Paul Courant, dean of libraries for the University of Michigan, said the lawsuit came as a surprise because he said the Orphan Works Project does not harm any authors. “Since we don’t know who the owner is, the owner isn’t being harmed,” he said. “If the owner comes forward we would, of course, be immediately responsive to his or her concerns. In time, I really hope that our work will lead
flashback
Ithaca Motion Picture Project exhibit celebrates history of silent film in the area, page 13 f ind m or e. onl ine. www.t heit hacan.org
clean up
City wants to fix homeless problem by clearing out the Jungle, page 10