Red Stick Animation Festival returns downtown for sixth year, p. 3
Reveille LSU establishes downfield passing attack against Alabama, p. 5
The Daily
Volume 115, Issue 56
www.lsureveille.com
Baton Rouge bars allow dogs to join in nightlife fun, p. 9 Thursday, Nov. 11, 2010
HC court Hundreds of students protest Provision voting budget cuts at State Capitol could aid cuts to ends today higher ed Kayla DuBos
Contributing Writer
The 2010 Homecoming Court has been selected, and voting for this year’s king and queen is open until 4 p.m. today. This year’s nominees for homecoming queen are business management senior and Student Government vice president Dani Borel, psychology senior Kristin Davis and mass communication senior Aly Neel. The nominees for homecoming king are mass communication senior Francis Boustany, sociology, criminology and African American studies senior Devon Wade and human resources and leadership development senior Stuart Watkins. Voting for homecoming king and queen can be done online. Students can log into PAWS and click on “Homecoming Elections” under the drop-down menu in “Student Services” to vote. This year’s number of court applicants has doubled, according to Katie McGee, assistant dean of students and associate director of Student Advocacy and Accountability. “The number of applicants made this year’s selection process extremely competitive,” McGee said. Contact Kayla DuBos at kdubos@lsureveille.com
Matthew Albright Staff Writer
speakers, Samuels blasted Jindal from a podium on the building’s front doorstep. “The governor scolds the higher education community for whining,” Samuels complained, to widespread boos. “We don’t just have a deficit of dollars. We have a deficit of new ideas, a deficit of vision and a deficit of political courage from our leaders.” In between speakers, organizers led the crowd in repeated chants, including “Where is Bobby,” “Save our state, educate” and “When they say cutbacks, we say fight back.” Protesters also carried signs, ranging from distributed ones saying “Stand up for higher education,” to
As higher education and health care suffer continued cuts in state funding much more severe than other parts of the budget, state officials have claimed their hands are tied. A maze of constitutional and statutory dedications protect huge swaths of the state’s budget. Higher education and health care are the only major programs that don’t enjoy such protections, so they get cut significantly worse than the rest. But a provision nestled deep in the state’s constitution may mean that conventional wisdom isn’t entirely true. Article VII, Section 10, Subsection F, Subsubsection 2a says that “adjustments to any constitutionally protected or mandated allocations or appropriations ... are authorized when state general fund allocations or appropriations have been reduced in an aggregate amount equal to at least seven-tenths of one percent of the total of such allocations and appropriations for a fiscal year.” Simply put, this means the state has the authority to cut 5 percent from even those programs that are constitutionally protected once the state’s general fund is cut by at
RALLY, see page 15
PROVISION, see page 15
SHEILA DE GUZMAN / The Daily Reveille
Protesters hold signs Wednesday during the Rally for Higher Education. See photos and a video from the rally at lsureveille.com.
Matthew Albright Staff Writer
An incensed wave of students surged up the State Capitol steps Wednesday, blasting Gov. Bobby Jindal for continued cuts to state higher education funding. The Rally for Higher Education drew about 500 students from throughout the state — students in LSU purple and gold were sprinkled throughout a crowd of University of New Orleans and Southern University blue, Southeastern Louisiana University green, and Nicholls State University and University of Louisiana at Lafayette red. “Bobby Jindal, where are you? Can you please show your face?” shouted Southern political science
junior Dadrius Lanus through a megaphone, to thunderous applause. “We will not stand for this.” The protest was organized by the Education Now coalition, which links student protest groups at several of the largest state universities in Louisiana, like Save UNO and LSU’s Proud Students. Originally organized by Save UNO, the protest eventually grew to include several universities. Southern University professor Albert Samuels called roll as he addressed the crowd, eliciting cheers from the different institutions as he called out their names. “When young people get together, you can literally change the world,” Samuels told the crowd. Like the rest of the dozen
BUDGET CUTS
Nicholls students start protest group Campaign aims to inform businesses Catherine Threlkeld Staff Writer
Nicholls State University students have started their own budget cut protest campaign to make businesses realize how important their university is to the area. The long-term goal of the group, called “Stand Up 4 La,” is to get a constitutional amendment to protect higher education or lift protections on other parts of the state budget,
leveling the playing field when it comes to budget cuts, said Nicholls State art senior Amy Marie Mahler. Since 2008, Nicholls has suffered a 29-percent budget cut and is facing another 35-percent cut in July 2011, Mahler said. “Which means, if worst case scenario, we would lose about 2,000 students,” Mahler said. “We’d lose 18 degree programs, and we’d lose countless faculty and staff.” Stand Up 4 La was started by students who were upset with budget cuts, Mahler said. “We kept saying, ‘I wish we could do this,’” Mahler said. “Instead of just talking, we decided to
do something. It’s not just one department. It’s made up of students from all over campus.” One point the campaign is pushing is the My Dollar Campaign, where each time patrons visit businesses in Houma and Thibodaux, they bring fake dollars. Mahler said a faculty member brought a fake dollar to a local gas station. “The next week he went back to the same gas station and asked if they’d gotten any more dollars, and the person behind the cash register pulled out a really big stack of NICHOLLS, see page 15
SHEILA DE GUZMAN / The Daily Reveille
Nicholls State University students protest Wednesday during the Rally for Higher Education at the State Capitol. NSU recently began its own protest campaign.