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wednesday 10/27/10 | MACE & CROWN | A3
Blow out the candles ODU’s Upward Bound is 24 by
Yvonne de los Santos Contributing Writer
Marie Rodwell was just a twinkle in her mother’s eye when Old Dominion University added Upward Bound to its list of programs 24 years ago. Marie,18, and Upward Bound crossed paths two years ago when she found herself on the verge of repeating her sophomore year at Norview High School. Today she is hoping to attend Johnson and Wales University to become a chef and is enrolled in ROTC. Marie is among 69 high school students partici-
pating in the federally funded program that targets low-income students to prepare for college entrance. Students from Norfolk and Portsmouth who have parents that have not attended college qualify for the ODU program. Marie falls in both categories. When Marie’s grades in math and English started to drop her guidance counselor called the only shepherd in her family: her older sister. “My guidance counselor told my sister about my grades and my sister signed me up,” said Marie. Marie spents her weekdays as a senior at Norview High and every other Saturday and her summers at ODU taking college prep courses. Marie gets help by certified teachers. The program begins in the fall and meets every other Saturday from 8:30 a.m. until 1 p.m. During the summer Marie lives on-campus at ODU for six weeks and earns a stipend. More than that, the program teaches
Marie life skills that she quickly practiced her first summer on-campus. Every morning a fresh stack of newspapers were delivered at the Webb where Marie ate breakfast. That is when she took solace in reading The Virginian-Pilot. “I did not want to just sit at breakfast and look like a loner so I pretended that I had something to do and sat with the paper. Eventually I started to read the paper and found interesting stuff that I like to read,” said Marie. Upward Bound is “$336,500 of seriousness,” said Ollie Tolliver the director of the ODU program. “The program started at ODU in 1986 and is a proven success,” said Tolliver. The funds pay for Tolliver’s salary and two teachers. Three mentors are also paid to assist in preparing students for the ACT and SAT. Carleen
Spirit day brings color to campus Elizabeth Mazzora Contributing Writer
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A bouquet of colorful flowers lined up in the order of a rainbow; purple ribbons lay simply on the table; a giant white board where students could write whatever anti-hate messages they saw fit. October 20, 2010 was Spirit Day at ODU, as well as across the country, in memory of the six LGBTQ (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer) students—Tyler Clementi, Seth Walsh, Raymond Chase, Justin Aarberg, Billy Lucas, and Asher Brown— who committed suicide after being subjected to bullying at their schools. Many students across campus wore purple—the color purple in the LGBTQ flag stands for spirit—and the information table at the “Speak Out—No Hate” program in the Webb Center gave out purple ribbons and information pamphlets. Manned by Counseling services and several LGBTQ students, “Speak Out—No Hate” sought to encourage students to write their anti-hate and anti-bullying messages. Some of the messages on the board included, “GOD IS LOVE” and “F*CK HATE.” One student drew a rainbow on the board. Tahj Mitchell, who helped man the table and Vice-President of ODU Out, was at there from the start of the program at 12 pm to the end, at 5 pm. I met with him in the ODU Out office, which is in the U-Center and is easily distinguishable by the large rainbow flag and the safe space logo, and interviewed him. Q: So, what was “Speak Out—No Hate” about? A: It was for Spirit Day due to the recent suicides of those teens this past month and summer. We wanted to encourage students to wear purple, and we gave out purple ribbons. By the end of the program, all the ribbons were gone. Q: What was your role as part of SPNH? A: I am the student representative for the gay community and ODU Out [the LGBT club on campus]. I gave out information about Safe Space. Q: Do you think the program was successful? A: Yes. A lot of people who went to the table were already wearing purple and still came up to the table. I think the Rainbow flowers were beautiful. Q: What do you believe is the biggest problem with LGBTQ life on campus? A: Not everyone is educated about the GLBTQIA(Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer, Intersexual, Asexual) community or Safe Space. For example, when we did Trans-talk last year, the majority of the students just came for extra credit. They didn’t actually know about the Trans community.
Q: What do you think we can do to prevent bullying and to ensure that LGBTQ students know they are safe here on campus? A: More people need to be educated. I think ODU Out and Safe Space should make more programs to educate students. And if they do educate them, students in the closet and incoming LGBTQ freshman can feel they are safe and part of the community and are loved for who they are. The recent, unfortunate suicides do indeed teach us that there is not being enough done to help LGBTQ students feel safe. Though Spirit Day is over, that does not mean that the lesson ends there too. We, as a community, must come together to prevent cyber-bullying, bullying, and hate. The “It Gets Better” campaign has tried to convey this message with people like Ke$ha and Barack Obama making videos encouraging LGBTQ youth that life does get better. Organizations like “FCKH8” have posted video mirrors on youtube beckoning for gay rights and acceptance of gay love. As for what Mitchell says, it’s true that not many students are educated about LGBTQ support on campus; and lack of support, studies show, is the main reason why LGBTQ youth turn to suicide. The Trevor Project, an organization made to help troubled LGBTQ youth, says that LGBTQ teens are four times more likely to commit suicide than their heterosexual counterparts. For LGBTQ students on campus, we’d like you to know that ODU is more than willing to support you. In the beginning of the year, when the Attorney General of Virginia sent a letter wrote to revoke all LGBTQ students and teachers their protection in colleges, ODU (as well as many other colleges in Virginia) refused to do so, and President Broderick sent a personal email to all students stating that, “It is important to note that Old Dominion University does not and will not discriminate, nor do we tolerate discrimination against anyone on our campus.” Along with the President’s support, ODU Out is also here. ODU Out is an LGBTQ organization for LGBTQ students and their allies. ODU Out welcomes all students, teaches about LGBTQ life and tries to make LGBTQ student life better. They meet Tuesdays during activity hour, usually have a “Gaymes Night” on Tuesday nights at 7 pm in the James River Room, and their office can be found in the U-Center. Finally, Safe Space is a program “created through the Division of Student Affairs to reduce homophobia/transphobia and heterosexism on the Old Dominion University campus,” according to the ODU website. Should an LGBTQ student feel threatened, they can go to a “Safe Space” which is usually denoted by an upside-down rainbow triangle. There is more information on the ODU website, including Safe Space allies, some of which include some Hall Directors, Ms. Geneva Walker-Johnson, and the ODU Out office.
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Robinson is one of them. She is in her junior year at ODU working towards a bachelor of science degree in psychology. Carleen is a graduate of Upward Bound’s Howard University program in Washington, D.C. where she is from. Like Marie, Carleen did not have her parents help her towards her future. Instead, it was her grandmother who signed her up to the program. “My mom had four other girls and my dad three, it was my grandmother who is in her 70’s that taught me old school values,” said Carleen. Carleen finished Paul Laurence High School in Washington, D.C. with a 3.7 GPA, the fifth in her class. “If it wasn’t for Upward Bound; the drills, the Saturday morning classes, being ahead in classes like calculus--I don’t know if I would have stuck it out in college,” said Carleen.
Campus by the Numbers: Interesting Facts about ODU By Siaga Johnson Staff Writer As members of the ODU community we often wonder about certain numbers like how many degree programs are offered, how many faculty members we have, how well represented international students are, as well as other questions of the sort. Although this information is available to us in many different forms, accessing some of it would require that we take the time to add statistics, and we certainly have no time for that! Another important question that is often raised is how much money ODU spends on certain things. Whatever the question may be, awareness is always important. The fact that this campus has over recent years become heavily populated is no secret, however statistics have shown that the student to faculty ratio is 17 to 1. That’s a lot of students! This can also be seen in the fact that seats for classes often fill up very quickly, and classes often have no empty seats. The large number of students is also shown in the fact that ODU offers 69 Bachelor’s Degrees, 55 Master’s Degrees, 41 Doctoral Degrees, and 2 Educational Specialist degrees. Distance Learning programs are also very extensive, offering 50 different degree programs online, via satellite or CDROM. The Undergraduate population rests at 18,253 students, with 5,760 Graduate students, and 1,408 International Students from 130 different countries. The number of Alumni exceeds 100,000 countrywide, and also in 73 different countries. In terms of
faculty members, the population is represented by 730 full time and 650 part time faculty members. This information therefore puts into perspective just how largely populated our campus is. One may also wonder about minute details such as how many items are in the library, for example. As random as that may seem, the answer is 3.3 Million. One may also ask how much Old Dominion spends for research and other studies to obtain data, including development of the campus in terms of infrastructure. Over the years, the bill for these studies and development has come up to 96.2 Million Dollars. A major economic fact about ODU is that 1 Billion Dollars is contributed to the economy yearly. That is the price of five large Boeing passenger jets. Moreover, this makes ODU the leading factor in job creation in the region. Athletic statistics show that there are 16 intercollegiate sports teams, and that there are 28 different national championships that the 16 teams have participated in. With the addition of a football team, ODU continues to grow its athletic variety rapidly. Apart from athletics, extracurricular activities are represented by 200 student organizations, with new ones being established each year. This therefore shows a great deal of student involvement on campus as well as within the Hampton Roads Community. Learning facts about what numbers represent our campus not only gives us numerical information to remember, we are also given insight into how the economy is affected by our research initiatives, our contributions to the government, as well as what sort of job markets are opened up just by contributing Billions of dollars to the economy yearly. Through understanding what numbers represent our community, we are able to measure the impact that each and every one of us has.