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TUESDay, FEBRUARY 28, 2012
SOLAR from p.1 organization which aims to connect students to the green building movement. Schaefer anticipates USGBC members will primarily be students with architecture, engineering, construction management and business as a major seeking careers in sustainable building. USGBC plans to expand current green initiatives on campus, including partnering with the Charlotte Green Initiative, which fosters sustainability on campus and allocates funds from a green student tuition fee. Schaefer said one goal of USBGC Students is to bridge the gap and bring groups promoting a green campus together. One major step will be joining the UNC Charlotte Solar Decathlon team, which will work for two years designing, building and testing original solarpowered houses. “One of my hopes is that [USGBC officers and advisory board] get people who are interested in USGBC to be interested in the Solar Decathlon so we can help and get hands-on experi-
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OCCUPY from p.1 ence with green building,” said Schaefer. UNC Charlotte has been selected to compete in the 2013 Solar Decathlon, hosted by the U.S. Department of Energy. Twenty collegiate teams were selected from around the world. UNC Charlotte will compete against schools including George Washington University, California Institute of Technology, Stanford University and Vienna University of Technology. The teams will take their houses to Orange County Great Park in Irvine, California for judging in 10 contests, including architecture, market appeal, affordability, appliances and home entertainment. “You don’t understand [a building] until you see it. You can look at pictures but it’s not the same as when you experience the space yourself,” said Schaefer. In the appliances contest, houses are evaluated on the efficiency and effectiveness of appliances powered by solar energy. Refrigerators and freezers must maintain designated functional temperatures and dishwashers and
clothes washers and dryers must complete full cycles. 2013 Solar Decathlon will learn valuable skills by building their own houses as well as assessing houses of their competitors. As part of the home entertainment contest, teams host two dinner parties for other contestants and VIP guests, such as media and government employees. All meals must be prepared in the houses using the solar energy powered appliances. Dinner parties are evaluated according to the quality of the meal provided and overall setting and atmosphere of the house. With these contests ahead, the UNC Charlotte team begins tackling the first of many challenges on the path to the Solar Decathlon. “[In architecture] you have a problem and there are [so many] different ways can you solve it. You have to pick the right one, or the better one, and go with it and stand behind it,” said Schaefer. For more information about USGBC Students, email usgbcstudents@ uncc.edu.
HECK LAKE from p.1
The construction site where Hechenbleikner is being drained and redone due to the compromised dam that is affecting the surrounding environment. Photo courtesy of Ciera Choate brush and made the dam, on top of which now lies Broadrick Blvd. With the trees and other vegetation gone from the small valley, water from a nearby inlet quickly filled the area. “The magic of the water added to the ambience of the campus,” wrote Ken Sanford in his book “Charlotte and UNC Charlotte: Growing Up Together.” Dr. Heck even bought a pair of swans to occupy the lake. Once construction began on the Rowe Building the swans fled the area. Dr. Heck, who would not stand for the loss of his swans, took a plane around the county in an attempt to find them. He could not, and shortly after the Canadian geese found their way to campus. The takeover was swift. Although an integral part of this campus and nearly one of the first things visitors see upon their arrival, Heck Lake’s story is poorly known amongst 49ers. It’s not the only story forgotten by students after its genesis. The amnesic quality seems prevalent amongst the students at UNC Charlotte. “The history of the university needs to be transcribed in one place, like a document or booklet for students to seek out,” said homecoming king and co-founder of Niner Traditions Matt Murrow.
Did you know:
Fast facts and a lie about UNC Charlotte Fact: Before 1970, the university
ran out of water several times, resulting in cancelled classes. Fact: There is a graveyard on campus. Fact: Charlotte College’s mascot was an Owl. Fact: Charlotte College began at Central High School which is now the current location of Central Piedmont Community College’s downtown campus. Fiction: The Belk Tower was originally supposed to be a pen and ink well. The truth: The Belk Tower was built to be “reaching towards excellence,” and the so-called ink well was supposed to be the location of the bell.
A protestor on Jan. 30 yelling at the Charlotte Mecklenburg Police Department for taking down a makeshift tent and arresting fellow protestors. MCT Campus Although she claims not to care about journalistic awards, she takes pride in one judge’s comments. The Gold Gamma judge told her, “You could have made it preachy. You took us into these peoples’ lives.” This is what Rhi calls covering a story from the inside out. “What it’s about is amplifying the peoples’ voices,” she said. She recalls reading a story about Occupy Wall Street when it first began in which the journalist quoted anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan. This reporting seemed lazy to Rhi. “What the hell does she have to do with anything? Give people equal weight,” said Bowman. To “amplify people’s voices” is why she now stands here with a confused and standoffish young man not sure if he will be spending the night in a cell or a wet tent. Rhi, heading to the city council meeting in sleep-ready clothes, has a similar lack of knowledge when it comes to where she will lay her head tonight. In her car, parked a block or so down the road, she has packed enough sandwiches to stay on site for two to three days. She has blankets and even a fold out desk in the back seat in case she needs to get some work done. “You need to be prepared,” she says, wondering whether Charlotte will turn into scenes similar to those happening in Oakland, New York and other Occupy sites. “[The police] sort of wait until everyone stops paying attention, then they move in.” This is not the place Rhi would like to be spending a chilly Monday night. She has other things she would like to be working on. Her top priority professionally is to push the book ideas that she has been working on to publishers in New York and across the country. However, she feels that she is needed here. This feeling is ingrained in her personality, according to Kim Lawson, an editor at Creative Loafing, where most of Rhiannon’s Occupy work was published. Kim also calls Rhiannon a good friend. “She’s just a great storyteller that cares about community issues,” said Lawson. “She’s very aware, but she’s smart about being aware.” She loves hiking but hasn’t been able to lately because of her busy work schedule. “I have been doing a lot of urban hiking,” she says, referring to her coverage of the Occupy Charlotte movement. A car accident two years ago fractured her spine and made it nearly impossible to do one of her favorite activities: tent camping. She toughed it out, however, through a night of camping with a group of protestors early on in the Occupy movement. “I definitely paid the price,” she said. “I was in serious pain for a couple of days.” That was just another way of telling the story from the inside out. “I just felt like someone needed to be out there without a bright light and a camera. [The Occupiers] weren’t media savvy at that point.” It’s almost as if she hears a calling when a story breaks; a calling that tells her nobody else will tell this story if she doesn’t. “She’s so thorough and some stories have so many different sides to tell,” said Desiree Kane, a friend of Rhiannon’s. “That sort of thing will suck in any good journalist.” Rhi remembers the day she heard about the Occupy Charlotte camp forming on Twitter. “I was really looking forward to having a Saturday to myself, but I knew
that I had to go. I just feel this strange obligation to my community to tell them what’s happening,” in a tone that makes it hard to tell if sarcasm is prevalent or she really finds her own feeling of obligation strange. Rhiannon’s husband, Dan, has seen the way stories like this can envelope her. “She needs to know, ‘How did we get to this point?’ Once she starts down that path, it consumes her,” he said. “It’s her passion.” At the meeting, the city council passes a measure that will have the occupiers legally ousted from their camp on the following Monday. As certain controlled chaos breaks out inside of city hall, with most of the occupiers in attendance now chanting slogans, Rhi zones in, seemingly in her natural habitat. Rhiannon is a full head shorter than most of the people in the lobby, but her presence is known by everyone. She slips comfortably between multiple conversations; interviewing police about the way the eviction will be carried out, phoning a lawyer who had threatened to sue if the measure was passed, carrying on nonchalant conversations with occupiers to find out their next move. Everyone in the building, it seems, knows her and is comfortable talking to her. One occupier, Robby, is telling her that he is comfortable with the decision and he already has bigger plans than camping. When she asks him for more details he smiles and says, “You gotta wait for our next move.” Rhi rolls her eyes as the man walks away. Her response may be based on the seemingly obvious fact that he has no clue what his own next move will be. More probably, she is coming to the realization that there is no end in sight for a reporter so far inside the story. It’s the awareness that Lawson mentioned, a brick wall that is nearly impossible to slip anything past. “Rhi is who she is all the time, so when you meet her you get a pretty good sense of who she is,” said Kane. “If you ask Rhi a question she is going to give you a straight up answer whether she’s known you for ten years or ten minutes.” Three weeks later, Rhiannon is at her home going through files. She’s “stepping back” to write a more broad story on the entire Occupy Charlotte movement for Charlotte Magazine. The deadline for the camp has come and gone and seven people have been arrested. Rhiannon spent the day of the raids at the camp as a reporter. She spent that night as a patient in the emergency room. She had been working for 30 hours straight with only a 30 minute nap in between. “It was just pure exhaustion,” she says of that hospital trip. The doctor left a note in her paperwork pleading for her to “not do anything for a week.” She took his advice. Now, as she gets ready to tackle the big picture of Charlotte’s Occupy movement, she thinks her recent hospital visit has put things into perspective. “I’m realizing that life is short and you have to do what makes you happy,” says the woman who dropped her job selling annuities to pursue a writing career in 2006. “You need to be able to pay your bills and stuff but don’t get into anything for the money,” she says. “God knows nobody gets into journalism for the money.”