V
V
OTE ggieland
2011
Primary voting for the 2011-2012 yell leaders, student senate and student body president positions is today. Runoffs, if necessary, will be Thursday and Friday.
thebattalion ● tuesday,
voices
thebatt.com
Making sense of issues
The Battalion’s endorsee The Battalion editorial board interviewed candidates and chose to endorse Hilary Albrecht for student body president. Reasons for this endorsement can be found on thebatt.com.
‘The Battalion’ aims to serve students by reporting as fair and balanced as possible
march 1, 2011
● serving
texas a&m since 1893
● first paper free – additional copies $1 ● © 2011 student media
Cadets take newspapers on campus newspapers. The Corps was aware that a story would be published Monday regarding the behavior of Josh Light, a junior yell In an effort to keep an article published leader candidate. in Monday’s paper from being read, Corps “We told them that we want this to get members took editions of The Battalion out, we feel like it was appropriate, and we from several campus stands but returned were comfortable with this coming out besome by mid-morning. cause we knew that this was something the Brett Bergamo, a senior information and student body needed to know,” Bergamo operations management major and head said. “We specifically said do not take Batyell leader, said cadets were told at a meet- talions in the morning.” ing Sunday night not to take Monday’s Bergamo said he knows of a group of
Megan Ryan The Battalion
cadets who took copies of the newspaper, but he said the cadets put them back before 9 a.m. “I was at Wehner, and I saw them put them back at 9 o’clock,” Bergamo said. “They said they returned them, and I believe them. I don’t know if there was a completely different incident, but the group that I caught returned [the papers]. They said they took them from West See Newspapers on page 2
Taylor Wolken junior economics major
M
istakes are all but guaranteed during the college experience, but when properly handled, they can provide the best lessons and develop the strongest character. During this election season I hope candidates and students learned a little something. Thanks to your thoughts, comments and concerns, I know The Battalion staff has. In student body elections, a few Aggies will be chosen to fill a small number of positions where they will represent nearly 50,000 students. As the primary media outlet covering student body elections, we take coverage seriously. Some news coverage has come under fire, as happens during elections, when the student body is divided into factions of supporters for various candidates. This dynamic culminated in the act of stealing thousands of issues of Monday’s edition of The Battalion. At The Battalion, we strive to keep the student body informed to the best of our ability on the candidates and the issues. Unfortunately, what might be relevant news to one student could be “muckraking” to another student. Reporting information on one candidate might be seen as unfair to that individual’s supporters, but not reporting it would be unfair to the other candidates and our readers. While some candidates might
Jake Ross — THE BATTALION
The flabby five Texas has five of the 10 fattest cities in America $15 billion on overweight and obesity related health problems. Dr. John SimThe Battalion Maybe everything is bigger in Texas. mons, assistant professor of family and community medicine and physician for According to recent men’s health research, Texas has five of the top 10 fat- the Texas A&M Health Science Center College of Medicine, said such reports test cities in the U.S. in the past year. The rankings are based off of the over- of obesity in Texas are not surprising. “This is something to be expected. weight and diabetes type 2 populations, Texas is always ranked between eight the percentage of people who haven’t and 15 on fattest states in the nation. left their couch in a month from CDC The BMI, body mass index, relating the reports, the money spent on junk food height and weight of a person, give you from the Bureau of Labor Statistics and a number. The higher the number, the the number of people who ate fast food worse, a BMI of 25 is overweight, and nine or more times in a month from 30 and up is obese,” Simmons said. “To Mediamark Research. give you an idea, the average American In 2010, the Texas Department of male is 5 feet 9 inches, so being at 175 State Health Services estimated spending pounds, you are considered overweight,
Amber Jaura
and at 200 pounds, obese. The average American female is 5 feet 4 inches and overweight at 150, obese at 175 pounds. Two-thirds of the U.S. now is overweight 25 percent of the U.S. population is obese.” Simmons said the rates of overweight and obese people have increased exponentially over the past 10 years, and it’s up to society to realize that things need to change before they get out of hand. “The average overweight person spends $1,500 more a year in health care costs than a healthy person. A lot of Texans are on Medicaid so they’re not actually paying that medical bill but See Texas on page 8
Texas top 10 Five of the top 10 fattest cities are in Texas. The Texas Department of State Health Service estimated spending $15 billion on overweight and obesity related problems. No. 1: Corpus Christi No. 3: El Paso No. 4: Dallas No. 7: San Antonio No. 9: Houston
See Lessons on page 2
community
silver taps
Academy provides rescue experience is a live fire burn demonstration, as well as CPR and first The Battalion Firefighters have responsibil- aid courses provided to participants. ities and obligations to uphold “The class is a taste of what rescue procedures within the it would be like to have the community. The College Staabilities that firefighters need,” tion Citizen’s Fire Academy is Giedraitis said. a program for people who want Many class participants have to learn more about the local stories and experiences from the fire department. Participants training. A community action range in age from18 to 80 years response team was organized old. Day-to-day operations, out of the first academy alumni injury and fire prevention proassociation. grams are taught to participants. “The first class wanted to keep “The most important thing is helping citizens and get involved to educate citizens about what by staying, giving and doing, so we actually do,” said Cindy Giethey became the liaisons between draitis, who is involved in public the victims of the fire and getting education about the Fire Acadlife back to normal, ” Giedraitis emy. said. The academy is offered durPart of the impact of the ing the spring Monday evenings academy is the difference and and runs for 11 weeks. There understanding of the citizens
Nov. 13, 1990 - Feb. 11, 2011 Nicolis Terrel Williams
Friends remember student as positive
Christine Perrenot
Pg. 1-03.01.11.indd 1
Nico poured into other people The Battalion and had a very Nicolis “Nico” Terpositive outlook. rel Williams, from Sugar Land, died Feb. 11, at the Katie Mahand, College Station Medical senior finance major Center after being hospitalized for bacterial meningitis. William’s death impacted the Aggie family, and he is missed by his friends and loved ones. Nico, 20, graduated from Kempner High School and was a junior economics major at Texas A&M. He made many positive contributions to the University through his involvement in FLIP, Fish Camp and CARPOOL. “This kid touched a lot of people,” said Nico’s father, Greg Williams. Nico was a student worker at Evans Library and a research assistant at the Educational Psychology PRA lab during his time
Christine Perrenot
J.D. Swiger — THE BATTALION
Participants in the College Station Citizen’s Fire Academy practice typical procedures for extinguishing fires. when the classes end. “After every class a student can be heard saying ‘wow,’” Giedraitis said. With the largest group of residents in the area being student renters, it becomes increasingly important for students to understand safety and how to be cautious. “It helps if the public un-
derstands the training we do, as each specialization takes special training,” said Bart Humphreys, public information, research and planning officer. The academy provides information on the hiring process for firefighters, safety education and CPR training, portable fire See Academy on page 4
See Williams on page 6
2/28/11 10:18 PM