thebattalion
THE BATTALION N PRESENTS:
Spring 2011
100 Years of Success
● tuesday,
april 12, 2011
● Serving
Texas A&M since 1893
● first paper free – additional copies $1 ● © 2011 Student Media
New Agricultural and Life Sciences Building Photo by Chad Shaw
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O
ut one night with your friends, you might decide to go to the strip club in College Station, The Silk Stocking. As you walk in and glance on stage, you see the woman that you sit next to in class. Does your opinion change of her?
enterprise | page 5
student by day, dancer by night Photo illustration by April Baltensperger — THE BATTALION
campus news Student wins award Junior management and business major Omar El-Halwagi was awarded the Harry S. Truman Scholarship by the Harry S. Truman Foundation. The scholarship goes to students pursuing a public service career and can provide up to $30,000. El-Hawagi is the first A&M student to receive this award since 1994. “This award helps when applying for jobs and means I’ve known from a younger age what I want to do,” El-Halwagi said. He is president of the A&M speech and debate team and teaches a class at Mays Business School. Christine Perrenot, staff writer
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books | 3 Brazos Valley Reads
Edwidge Danticat, author of the critically acclaimed novel The Farming of Bones is the speaker for this year’s Brazos Valley Reads, which will take place Thursday evening in Bryan.
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women’s basketball
WNBA drafts Colson, Adams Sydney Colson and Danielle Adams, who won a national championship with Texas A&M’s women’s basketball team, were selected in the second round of Monday’s WNBA Draft. Colson was chosen by the Connecticut Sun with the 16th overall pick and the fourth pick in the second round, and Adams went to the San Antonio Silver Stars as the 20th overall pick. “It’s crazy,” Colson said. “It seems like it all happened so quickly. Really, throughout your whole college career, all you want is to get a national championship.” Colson was traded right after the draft ended to the New York Liberty for Kalana Greene. Associated Press
Left: Senior Sydney Colson, was drafted to the Connecticut Sun, then traded to the New York Liberty. Right: Senior Danielle Adams, was drafted to the San Antonio Silver Stars.
See more on page 9 Stephanie Leichtle — THE BATTALION
community service
university research
Cyclists pedal for affordable housing projects
Professor pieces ancient history together Krystal Nimigian
Luz Moreno-Lozano The Battalion
Embracing its sixth summer trip, the nonprofit organization Bike & Build will take bicyclists on a route from Providence, R.I., to Bike & San Francisco, Calif., Build starting June 10. Eight routes will take place Bike & Build has during the course of donated more the summer, each with than $2.7 million 30 riders. over the past eight “It’s a once in a seasons. More lifetime opportunity,” than 1,250 young said David Walton, adults are involved rider and sophomore in solving the finance major. “Not affordable housing many people have this crisis in America. opportunity, and I want to take advantage of it while I had the time.” This 4,166 mile route will begin with a two-day orientation and a build day in Providence. Build days are dedicated to providing community service to benefit charities and organizations. Next, riders will embark on
Stephanie Leichtle — THE BATTALION
David Walton along with 30 other riders, will be riding a bicycle 4,123 miles from Rhode Island to California. a journey across Connecticut, through the hills of New York and toward Pennsylvania for a second build day in Harrisburg. Subsequently the next part of the trip will be passed through the Midwest plains and over the Rocky Mountains in Colorado before hitting Utah; from there they will finally meet the California border at San Francisco. Bike & Build “Pedaling for Affordable Housing” has contributed $2,780,000 to housing groups to fund projects planned See Bike on page 8
The Battalion The age and amount of research conducted at the Athenian Acropolis might leave many under the impression that archaeologists have uncovered all there is to be known about the marveled structure. One Texas A&M professor and architectural historian, Nancy Klein, received a $10,000 research grant from the University’s Division of Research and Graduate Studies to effectively counteract this idea. “We can always take another look. The greater the depths of research, the more questions arise,” Klein said. “The focus of my project is to provide information beyond the technical history and simply reconstructing what the structures originally looked like. If more research is done, we can figure out how the buildings were actually built — how the
blocks were cut, designed and fit together.” Klein said further research also means providing an archeological component, a life history of the building. Her investigation will seek to determine architectural developments on the Acropolis during the fifth and sixth century B.C. “I intend to get a good idea of what the Acropolis looked like before the Persians stormed it and before the Parthenon was built. Much of the art and architecture was destroyed in the sacking and was consequently rebuilt and recreated when the Greeks defeated the Persians later on. My study is going to put these buildings in that historical framework to understand how important they were in the early part of the sanctuary to Athena and what happened to them afterward,” Klein said. Klein’s associate, colleague See Acropolis on page 8
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