L&A: Gain grit this weekend, celebrate 89er day (Page 3)
Sports: Key players will miss Spring Game (Page 4)
Opinion: Be a part of OU tradition, go to the Spring Game (Page 2)
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ENVIRONMENT
Energy conservation leader wanted Students excited about new staff position focused on natural issues MATT WOODS
Campus Reporter @mataphor
OU President David Boren announced Thursday the university will post a staff position for a new environmental sustainability officer to coordinate with student groups and further green initiatives. Facilities Management director Brian Ellis will oversee the new environmental sustainability and energy conservation officer. Students involved in environmental groups have been advocating for a central position to improve coordination between the wide range of campus programs. Whoever takes the position will identify, collect, communicate and incorporate energy conservation and sustainability efforts into campus, Ellis said in an email.
The new position will let environmentally conscious students better share information and volunteer opportunities, said Jessica Scott, Geography and Environmental Sustainability Club president. Scott said she’s impressed with how closely administrators have listened to student concerns. However, Scott still plans to submit a document she has been drafting with other campus environmental leaders, which specifies to administrators the benefits of the new position. Ellis said he and his management team will select the new sustainability officer, but students won’t participate in “the university’s legal process for hiring.” However, Ellis said his team will seek out a candidate who will work closely with student-advocacy groups. The primary criteria for selecting their candidate include his/her ability to measure and verify sustainability initiatives, analyze the financial impact on university operations and communicate victories to the community, Ellis said. Alex Lyakhov, environmental sustainability graduate
student, harbors some concerns about the hiring process for the new position, but he said he remains cautiously optimistic. “I’d like the process of hiring this sustainability coordinator to be transparent so that students, staff and faculty have some input,” Lyakhov said. Lyakhov said he hopes to discuss the students’ ideas with Boren and Ellis to ensure the university’s resources align with student programs. Earth Rebirth founder Andrew Sartain said he’s not overly concerned about how the university will fill the new position, but he said officials should find a candidate qualified to handle the diverse range of responsibilities and set a high standard from the start. OU was recently recognized as the U.S. university with the “most widespread” student groups devoted to environmental sustainability by NerdScholar, a prominent informational SEE ENVIRONMENT PAGE 2
DUCK
WHERE’S SAMO DUCKY? Original of large duck sculpture series goes missing from Lions Park yesterday ALEX NIBLETT, Assistant Campus Editor, @alex_niblett
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ALEX NIBLETT/THE DAILY
t may not have been as famous as Donald Duck, but Thursday another famous duck (at least locally), Samo Ducky, was reported missing from a nearby park. A police report was filed at 10:24 a.m., said Norman Police Department Captain Tom Easley. Samo Ducky was the first of 12 duck statues that sit in Norman’s parks and was part of the Samo Ducky project. Each of the project’s ducks measure 44 inches tall and are made to replicate the original Samo Ducky sculpture created by Douglas Shaw Elder in 2010. Before it went missing, Samo Ducky resided in Lions Park next to the Norman Firehouse Art Center, but now all that’s left is a bare cement circle where the 200-pound Samo Ducky once rested. Elder, the executive director at the Firehouse Art Center, was saddened by Samo Ducky’s absence in the park and said because Samo Ducky was the original duck in the series, it wasn’t made with the same materials the other ducks were made of, which made it easier to steal. “All of the other ducks placed in children’s parks around Norman are made of fiberglass and bolted down to a cement pad,” Elder said. “This ducky, because it was the original, was made of plaster.” Elder sculpted the duck for the children in Lions Park, and at the time he created it, Norman’s Public Art Board was looking for a community project to take on. The Samo Ducky project took flight. The project gets three new ducks every year. Local artists submit their designs and if they’re accepted, they get paid and paint the duck, Elder said. Tulsa has decorated penguin statues as local landmarks,
A white plaster duck sits alone outside the Firehouse Art Center on Thursday afteroon. Samo Ducky, previously located next to this one, was a yellow duck reported missing this morning.
SEE DUCK PAGE 2
SGA
AMERICAN INDIANS
Students encouraged to apply for executive cabinet positions
Nearly 40 Okla. tribes to meet at Centennial Powwow at Lloyd Noble
Applications due by next Thursday SHAIDA TABRIZI Campus Reporter @ShaidaBee
Ap p l i cat i o n s f o r s tu dents interested in becoming a member of Student Government Association’s executive cabinet will be open until April 17. The executive cabinet is made up of directors for each of the five departments with one to 10 officers per department, said Student Government Association president Matt Epting said in an email. The applications are available on the SGA website. They are due April PHOTO PROVIDED/THE DAILY 17 at 4 p.m. Any student enrolled at Pictured are former Student Government Association President Ernest Ezeugo’s cabinet members. SEE SGA PAGE 2
WEATHER A few clouds early, otherwise mostly sunny. High 77F. Winds E at 5 to 10 mph.
OU will hold its largest cultural celebration for American Indians on Saturday at the Lloyd Noble Center, with more than 39 different Oklahoma tribes participating. The American Indian Student Association’s Centennial Powwow will celebrate the university’s first Centennial Powwow, said Turner Went-Worth Hunt, American Indian Student Association cultural affairs chair and Mr. Indian OU. “The University of Oklahoma had this powwow years before Native Americans were even considered citizens of the United States of America,” anthropology junior Hunt said. “This is a history-making event.” The powwow will begin with an afternoon prayer and a dance called a gourd dance, which will constitute the quieter portion of the event. After a dinner, there will be the grand entrance, with Fancy-style dancing, Hunt said. “To put this in different terms, if one applied sovereignty, which they rightly should, this would be the biggest meeting of nations, outside the U.N., in the United States,” Hunt said. For more information on the event, visit the American Indian Student Association’s website at ou.edu/aisa. Megan Deaton, ESCAPE Editor
Applications for students interested in becoming a member of SGA’s executive cabinet will be open until April 17.
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