February 19, 2018
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Campus mourns loss of DZ, golf team member Delta Zeta pres: “It just doesn’t feel like she’s really gone, it just feels like she’s on a long vacation.” SUMMER LEBEL Sports Editor
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Internet disruption prompts investigation Firewall problem leads to isolation of cause
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Shreena Bhakta dressed up with her fellow Delta Zeta sisters as cows during their sisterhood retreat. Bhakta made an effort to attend every event she could, Glava said.
Shreena Bhakta, a member of the women’s golf team and a sister at Delta Zeta, passed away in her Northside apartment on Jan. 31. In remembrance of the EMAC sophomore, Delta Zeta painted the spirit rocks with an elephant on Feb. 5. Elephants were Bhakta’s favorite animal, said marketing junior Mackenzie Glava, who serves as Delta Zeta’s president. “We had everyone paint their hands black and put it on the rock around (the elephant),” Glava said. “It was to symbolize all the people that she truly touched within her time here.” The sisters of Delta Zeta are helping each other through their grief in the wake of Bhakta’s passing, Glava said. “It just doesn’t feel like she’s really gone,” she said. “It just feels like she’s on a long vacation.”
Bhakta actively attended sorority events, including turtle dates – named after the sorority’s mascot – where sisters socialize with each other. “She truly made an effort to come to every single one, to just be there for anyone that needed it and just have as much fun as she could with the people that surrounded her,” Glava said. In addition to her commitment to Delta Zeta, Bhakta played with the UTD women’s golf team. Bhakta was completely deaf in one ear and partially deaf in the other. She was the only deaf golfer at UTD. “The fact that she had to overcome being deaf at birth is a tribute to what she was able to do, and to come to this school, of all schools, to come to play sports and to get her academics speaks volumes,” Athletic Director
→ SEE SHREENA, PAGE 7
Jindal offers freshmen full ride JSOM partners with Dallas ISD in new program to provide mentors, tutoring for high school students
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BHARGAV ARIMILLI Life & Arts Editor
The UTD campus lost internet connectivity for 12 hours last month, prompting an investigation from the Office of Information Technology. OIT Associate Vice President and Chief Technology Officer Brian Dourty said the first indication of a network issue occurred Jan. 20 at 1:58 p.m., when the office received an automatic notification about a problem with connecting to Galaxy. He said within 30 minutes of the first notification, OIT engineers were on site to troubleshoot. “The symptoms really manifested themselves as more of a firewall problem than a router problem, initially,” Dourty said. Engineers traced the network issue to a border router, a piece of equipment serving as a central receiving point for internet access from LEARN and UT System, UTD’s two internet service providers. As the situation became apparent, Cisco, UTD’s networking equipment manufacturer, sent engineers to help investigate. Dourty said this outage was unusual compared to previous ones. “The symptoms were very odd,” he said. “It wasn’t a complete failure. Some connectivity would go through and other connectivity wouldn’t.” Following a recommendation from Cisco, OIT engineers rebooted the system at 7 p.m., but were unsuccessful in restoring connectivity. “In any sort of troubleshooting effort, the goal is to isolate as many of the variables as possible, so you can really zero in on what the problem is,” Dourty said. “On a piece of equipment like this, it’s really complex. That’s not an easy thing to do.” According to OIT’s Twitter account, network access was restored at 12:03 a.m. on Jan. 21, but there were still intermittent service interruptions as engineers worked to replace the faulty equipment. The outage was fully re-
→ SEE INTERNET, PAGE 7
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High school students interested in the Jindal Young Scholars program tour Residence Hall West as Residential Life Coordinator Cody Queen (right) shows them the amenitites and the model dorm that UTD has to offer. CINDY FOLEFACK News Editor
In an effort to improve graduation and post-secondary education rates among lower-income communities, one UTD school is partnering with local high schools to provide students with a path to success. Students begin the program in their freshman year, and those who meet the program’s requirements upon graduation, including a high GPA, campus visits and participation in mentoring programs from Naveen Jindal School of Management students, are eligible for a full scholarship to JSOM. The School of Management partnered with the Dallas Independent School District to form the Jindal Young Scholars Program, holding the program’s kickoff event in early December. JSOM Dean Hasan Pirkul, who led the project, said the program is unlike existing merit-based aid programs, such as the Academic Excellence Scholarship. “The scholarship is only at the very end and a small part of (the program),” Pirkul said. “I want to make sure that we engage the high school students and number one, give them hope, because they will know that if they’re success-
ful, they get a scholarship. Number two, help them get there.” According to Dallas ISD, 88 percent of their students are from economically disadvantaged homes while 56 percent of its 2015 graduating class went on to college. Pirkul said the program is meant to help students starting in their freshman year and continue throughout high school until they graduate, at which point they’re eligible for the scholarship portion of the program. “It’s important to set the right goals, and we’re trying to get those kids, at that young age, to set the right goals for themselves,” Pirkul said. “So whatever they need to succeed, we want to make sure we are able, leveraging our own student body and our industry advisors, and partnering with others to make sure that they have it in place.” 84 students from the five participating high schools attended the kickoff event where they toured the campus, dined at Residence Hall West and met with representatives from UTD organizations. Pirkul said he’s received positive feedback from students and school administrators so far. “They love it,” he said. “They’re very
→ SEE SCHOLAR, PAGE 7
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During the tour, the high school students had the opportunity to hear from a panel of UTD students, including orientation leader and supply chain management sophomore Charlie Hooper.