GEORGIA REGENTS UNIVERSITY
www.grubellringer.com
VOLUME 57, ISSUE 4
TUESDAY, OCTOBER 7, 2014
Retired scholar writes about frontier
New eatery in the JSAC
By Jessica Sager copy editor
By Amy Thorne arts & life editor
Michael “Cowboy Mike” Searles is co-writing “Black Cowboys in the West,” an anthology about the little-known history of African-American cowboys. Searles, a former professor of history at Georgia Regents University, has been working on his book at the Center for the Study of Georgia History in Reese Library, Director Lee Ann Caldwell said. “Having him here is certainly a wonderful experience because he is a perennially upbeat, optimistic and happy person,” she said. “He’s a good scholar, he’s a hard worker and it’s nice to have that kind of person, you know, around.” Searles said his co-author is Bruce Glasrud. The two started working on the book last year, but were talking about the idea a few years ago. “We’ve collaborated before, and I knew him before that as well,” Searles said. “He is interested in black cowboys and the black West himself, and has been a scholar in that area for some time, and so we sort of had a lot in common.” Searles said he was fascinated with cowboys when he was very young, but came across a book, “The Adventures of The Negro Cowboys,” later. “(It) awakened me to the fact that there were black cowboys, because all the movies I’d gone to see when I was young…you didn’t see blacks in the movies at all, and so it was kind of interesting, cause I was always into black
A new Sodexo dining concept in the Jaguar Student Activities Center cafeteria celebrated its grand opening Sept. 30. Earl Evans, the area general manager, said Georgia Regents University brought Slice of Life to add more variety to the JSAC. “We had a pizza concept and that’s what we offered,” he said. “Now we can offer pastas, also the hot sandwiches on that concept.” Donny Jackson, retail manager, said he thinks the new addition to the cafeteria will benefit students. “Pizza also is an item I think (students) will be able to get in and get out faster,” Jackson said. “A lot of food at WOW is cooked to order.” He said the convenience of getting food faster will benefit students who have busy schedules. Whenever Georgia Regents’ dining services decides to make changes, it takes the students’ opinions into consideration, Evans said. “The reason we changed the concept is to get customer feedback,” he said. “We listen to our customer.” James Bowen, a senior marketing and management of information systems major, said he has already tried the spaghetti and meatballs and chicken pasta. He eats lunch in the JSAC almost every day. “Their vegetable pasta needs some help, but everything else is on point,” he said. “It’s better than a lot of the stuff that’s come out of there the last couple of years.” Despite the recent changes, he thinks there are several ways the school can improve the quality of their food service, he said. “They need to diversify and put other things in different locations around campus,” he said. “It wouldn’t take much to put a different restaurant in the science hall or Allgood.” He also said he had some dissatisfaction with the “crappy, crappy attitude” of some of Slice of Life’s employees. James McNeill, a junior nursing major, said he has also received very rude service when he bought food from Slice of Life. “The food is overly priced and the hours suck,” he said. “People who have 5 o’clock classes would like to be able to get something to eat.” Overall, he said he misses the Arsenal Grill.
see Cowboy on PAGE 2
JESSICA SAGER | STAFF
Michael “Cowboy Mike” Searles works on his anthology about black cowboys.
RICHARD ADAMS | STAFF
Breast cancer survivor Connie Thompson shows her support by hanigng a pink ribbon outside of the GRU cancer center.
Specialists aid in cancer fight By Ashley Trawick chief reporter The process of being diagnosed with breast cancer and getting treatments can take a large toll on a woman’s overall health. When diagnosing or going through treatment with breast cancer, several physicians complete a myriad of tasks for the benefit of the patient. Among those doctors for the Georgia Regents Health System is Mohammed Ziauddin, a breast surgical oncologist for Georgia Regents University. His job is to perform surgery on operable breast cancer patients, and he said he can do that in one of two ways. “(I would usually do) what’s commonly called a lumpectomy,” Ziauddin said. “It’s removing the breast cancer with clear margins, meaning normal tissue all the way around the shoulder to make sure you got the whole thing out, and then the other option is mastectomy, meaning removing the whole breast. Most patients, you know, probably 60 to 70 percent at least, are candidates to have breast-conserving therapy, which is lumpectomy plus radiation.” Ziauddin said he works with plastic surgeons a lot to do breast reconstruction, especially in some cases with mastectomies. He said plastic surgeons get involved even if they do a lumpectomy with the possibility of getting a breast lift or a reduction. Catherine Ferguson, an attending radiation oncologist, said she sees patients about the radiation, about whether it will benefit them, plans the radiation if she recom-
mends it, prescribes the treatment and monitors how the patient responds to receiving the radiation treatment. “For cancer care, in general, and breast cancer care, in specific, treatments (are) very often multi modality,” Ferguson said. “The three main modalities for cancer care are surgery, chemotherapy and radiation. A large portion of the patients that are treated for breast cancer receive radiation.” Ferguson said there are standards of care for the amount of radiation given for a particular risk of cancer in a particular setting and the dose that is administered varies because the treatment lasts for several weeks. “We generally prescribe a standard course of treatment but, of course, a standard dose is individualized for the patient’s body,” she said. “Radiation is prescribed for a delivered dose.” The director of breast imaging services, Karen Panzitta, said
the main imaging for examining breasts are mammograms, which help detect breast cancer early and allow for quicker treatment. “If someone has a lump in their breast or a problem with their breast, we do use mammograms to help determine what is the cause of that lump,” Panzitta said. “But we also use mammograms to screen women for breast cancer if they’re 40 or older. We do mammograms every year in women.” In addition to mammograms, Panzitta said it is recommended that women have yearly clinical breast exams by their health care provider. She said it should start when women are 20 years old. Panzitta also said younger women should feel what their breasts feel like and know what they consider to be normal. Women should give themselves self-breast exams on a monthly basis, she said, to detect something that may not be considered normal. atrawick@gru.edu
RICHARD ADAMS | STAFF
P.F. Chang’s shows its support for breast cancer awareness by painting its horse.
Military student has PTSD epidsode during exam By Rebecca Perbetsky production assistant Campus police were called to the scene after a student ran out of a classroom in University Hall. While on regular patrol, officers Peter Barbara and Kyle Golden were called to University Hall in response to a call about a student who possibly had a gun, according to the police report. Wafa Abed, substitute associ-
ate professor of mathematics, was giving a test, and according to the report she stated that the student, Robert Clasen, left a note on his test and then exited. The Bell Ringer reached out to Abed and received this: “I don’t think that what happened is something I would want to talk about in an interview,” Abed said. “I care more for the learning process to continue being smooth in an institution as wonderful as
GRU.” William McBride, chief of police, said the instructor must have assumed that Clasen was an officer. “The instructor was wearing (a) head covering like Muslims do,” McBride said. “(Clasen) was in a uniform.” According to the report, the note that Clasen left stated that he could not stay in the room because of previous military-related experiences.
“He just wasn’t doing real well dealing with the situation, and then when she shut the door to give the test, he just freaked out,” McBride said. Clasen, who, according to the report, suffers from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, was just having a bad day, McBride said. McBride did say that Clasen was at no point a danger or risk to anyone else in the room. rperbets@gru.edu
athorne@gru.edu
AMY THORNE | STAFF
Employee of Slice of Life refreshes pizza supply while awating customers.
Ebola Virus Page 2
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Page 11
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