TECHNICIAN
friday september
6
2013
Raleigh, North Carolina
technicianonline.com
Environment Committee kicks off semester Joseph Havey
ments and colleges took part in the meeting Thursday. Officially, PEC’s goal is to The N.C. State Physical En- act as an advisory body to the vironment Committee held vice chancellor of finance and its first meeting of the se- business. It reviews plans remester Thursday to discuss garding facilities, transportaupdates regarding University tion and landscaping. Facilities and Transportation. “As a whole, we review During the 20-minute meet- anything with transportaing, PEC aption and proved minw it h ca mute s f rom pus planning the previous and design,” meeting and said Erin assigned Champion, subcommitPEC chairtees. woman. “We Accordreally look at ing to Ron the plans of Grote, a sthings comsociate vice ing up and Tom Skolnicki, university chancellor give recomlandscape architect for facilities, mendations t hese subor approve committees are where the anything that’s going to get real work gets done. built on campus.” “This meeting was just an Tom Kendig, the director organizational meeting,” of university transportation, Grote said. “All the subcom- said the committee mainly mittee work is where every- benefits him by giving feedthing starts happening. Then, back on transportation’s upthey report out to this com- coming plans. For example, mittee.” next on the PEC agenda is a PEC is composed of faculty, discussion of the transportastaff and students. Represen- tion office’s physical master tatives from the office of in- plan. formation and technology, “It provides a sounding the graduate student association, and a variety of departPEC continued page 3 Deputy News Editor
“Historically, it has been a group that has raised sustainability awareness on campus.”
JOSEPH PHILLIPS/TECHNICIAN
Laying down another portrait, Luis Gomes and Sarah Hamideh help to spread the Inside Out 11M Project across the world.
Art display promotes diversity and immigration reform Staff report
An interactive art display promoting diversity and immigration reform came to N.C. State Thursday and will be here through Friday afternoon. The project, entitled Inside Out, drives its message home by acting as an enlarged photo booth. Students, faculty and staff wait in line for their photo to be taken, and those photos are printed out as large posters. Then their photo joins several dozen others in a mural spread across the Brickyard. “The project attempts to paint a portrait of America by noting that everyone is important to the fabric of America,” said Garry Morgan, assistant director of Diversity Programs. How long the posters will remain on the brickyard “will be a testament of N.C. State’s respect for diversity,”
said Tracey Ray, assistant vice provost for Student Diversity. Inside Out was created by the French artist JR. He designed it to promote equality and equity for the 11 million undocumented immigrants within the U.S. The project is funded by a $1 million grant from TEDx. Alejandro Morales, an illegal immigrant who volunteers with the project, disputed some stereotypes that are associated with immigrants. “[The stereotype] is that [immigrants] steal jobs, that we’re criminals and that we are here for the wrong reasons, but we aren’t,” Morales said. “We simply want to contribute to society.” Morales works with Inside Out so he can tell his story: He wants to become an Marine Corps officer. “If people heard our story, they would realize who we really are, people who want to serve,” Morales said.
SAM DeGRAVE/TECHNICIAN
Members of Local 1208, chant “Walmart, respect your workers!” in protest at the Glenwood Avenue Walmart Tuesday, Sept. 5. Walmart employees in 15 cities across the country held demonstrations to earn the right to unionize without fear of facing disciplinary action.
Walmart workers fight for collective bargaining rights Sam DeGrave Editor-in-Chief
Armed with a petition of more than 171,000 signatures, several protesters entered the Glenwood Avenue Walmart with no intention of shopping Thursday afternoon. The United Food & Commercial Workers International Union and OUR Walmart, an employeerun organization dedicated to ensuring that Walmart treats its workers with respect, led the movement, which called for the right for Walmart employees to collectively bargain and unionize without the risk of losing their jobs. Similar movements took place in 15 cities across the country Tuesday, after Walmart failed to meet a Labor Day deadline, set by OUR Walmart, to reinstate workers who the company allegedly fired for speaking out against it. Protesters at the Raleigh demonstration presented
their petition, which asked tain, you’ve got to move it,” Walmart to stop retaliation Plowe said. against employees who exerIn addition to the right to cise their right to unionize, to unionize, protesters requestthe management of the store ed a living wage. in hopes that it would be Director of the North Carpassed along to company ad- olina Justice Center’s Workministration. However, when ers’ Rights Project Carol the store manager declined Brooke said that and average the petition, organizers be- Walmart worker makes $8.81 gan to chant per hour. At “Walmart, this pay, an respect employee your workworking 40 ers” before hou r s p e r disbanding week would when police still fall officers arshort of the rived. 2013 Federal Tuesday’s Poverty Levprotests were el for a famthe largest ily of three, demonstrawhich is set David Zonderman, professor of history tion against at $19,530, t he comaccording to pany since last November’s Brooke. Black Friday protests and MaryBe McMillan, secrewere a necessary follow-up, tary treasurer of the North according to Cheryl Plowe, Carolina AFL-CIO, a state a Walmart employee of labor union organization, 20-years who participated in emphasized Brooke’s point the protest. during a forum that took “It’s going to take time, but place shortly before the prowhen you get to that moun- test.
“We’re not there yet, but potentially this really is the new generation of organizing.”
Professor researches micro-mites Sara Awad Staff Writer
Rob Dunn, assistant professor and director of Your Wildlife Project and biological sciences, along with other researchers, started the “Meet Your Mites” project this year aimed at sampling mites in order to better understand the evolution of the tiny arthropods. It sounds like something that came straight out of a
horror movie – tiny Demodex mites, naked to the human eye, crawling all over your face at night. Hundreds of these mites can inhabit a single hair follicle. Dunn said he wants to learn more about these mites in the near future. “These microscopic parasites (too small to feel or be seen with the naked eye!) spend their days hiding in our hair follicles, sucking on sebum (the oily secretions produced by the sebaceous
glands) and eating the cells lining the hair follicles. At night, under the cover of darkness, adult mites emerge, crawl around, and … mate on your face,” according to the project website. Project Research Assistant Megan Thoemmes said they hypothesized that the mites would be more diverse than previously thought, especially between the mites found on different people from around the world. Past research examined mites on cadavers,
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“We have Walmart workers who stock shelves with food but can’t feed their own kids,” McMillan said. “This kind of cruel irony cannot go unnoticed. The working poor cannot go unseen. And the causes of inequality cannot remain unspoken.” McMillan pointed to the right to unionize as the key to improving working conditions for the nearly 51,000 Walmart employees in North Carolina. “If we can change the south, if we can change Walmart, the behemoth of corporate greed born here in the south, then we can change the nation,” McMillan said. N.C. State Professor of history David Zonderman, also spoke at the forum, and though Zonderman said he was hesitant to be overly optimistic, he said that recent organization of workers, especially in the south, is promising. “We’re not there yet, but potentially this really is the new generation of organizing,” Zonderman said.
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but scientists only discovered two species of mites present on the human face, according to Dunn. “The first day that I found one,hearing that they crawl on your face, I did not sleep for four nights,” Thoemmes said. Previous research also failed to determine whether the mites were beneficial or harmful, though there appears to be a correlation be-
MITES continued page 3