Southern Accent
The student voice since 1926
INSIDE TODAY Mission trip in your backyard
NEWS | 2
Collegedale, Tennessee
Thursday, October 4, 2018
CELEBRATING LATINO AND HISPANIC CULTURE Tierra Hayes Editor-in-Chief In today’s special issue of the Southern Accent we will be celebrating Hispanic and Latino culture. Inside includes articles from a variety of voices on campus about family dynamics, worship, food and many other aspects that make up this unique culture.
Sept. 15 through Oct. 15 is the designated National Hispanic Heritage Month. These days mark the anniversaries of when Latin countries in the Americas gained their independence. At Southern, many steps are taken to celebrate the contributions of this community. On the promenade and across campus, these banners
with pictures of prominent Latinos in the U.S., the Adventist Church and from Southern. Some of the biggest celebrations come through Southern’s Latin American Club (LAC). On Sept. 25-28, they hosted the Ghetto preacher, a Puerto Rican pastor that shared his story during convocation, vespers and during all three church services at the Collegedale
Students participate in disaster relief for Hurricane Florence
Ninja Warrior tryouts and extreme dodgeball
NEWS | 2-3
SJC construction to add classrooms
NEWS| 3
STUDENT VOICES | 4
Growing up in two worlds
STUDENT VOICES| 4
At last, the Chicago Bears are good! SPORTS | 6
What are arepas? LIFESTYLE | 7
Seventh-day Adventist Church. The club also sponsored a taco truck on Oct. 26 and continued their Fuerza Bryan campaign for student Bryan Arvelo. They will host their main event of the year on Saturday Sept. 6., which will feature singing, dancing and food for the Southern community to experience.
Village Market meal plan requests Cameron Reel Staff Writer
BreeAnn Adams, Elaine Hayden, Courtney Calvert, Samir Khalil Courtesy of Laura Racovita-Szilagyi Autumn Dunzweiler Staff Writer Three students had the opportunity to participate at Southern Adventist University’s first Disaster Response Team last week. They were able to help those that got affected by Hurricane Florence. These students were deployed to do muck outs, which involve removing debris after flood waters recede. They removed the wet carpet, cut down trees and cleaned up yards.
One of those students, social work junior Samir Khalil, said, “This experience really helped show me the power natural disasters have over humans, but the power of God showed much stronger with all the volunteers jumping into the mess to help as many people as they could.” Laura Racovita-Szilagyi, associate professor of the School of Social Work, hopes that this program begins to grow and the word spreads. There are nine students who have taken
the course and are ready to be deployed, or already have been deployed. Courtney Calvert, graduate student studying for her masters in Global Community Development, was also deployed. “I am very appreciative of the great team I got to work with and am very glad that Southern provided this opportunity,” Calvert said. “For me, studying for a career as a development professional with a focus on See DISASTER page 2
Is Southern racist? Psychology department researches race relations on campus Becca Overstreet Staff Writer
The day I left my country
Vol. 74 Issue 5
Ruth Williams, professor in the School of Education and Psychology, and her team are conducting a research test regarding race relations. They posed the question: “Is Southern Racist?” In the 2018 winter semester, Mia Budescu’s 11-question-survey, “Perceptions of Systemic Racism,” was administered to 417 Southern Adventist University students. This survey aimed to address how much a student believes he or she is impacted by systemic or institutional racism. At the end of the survey Williams and her team asked, “Is Southern racist?” By the vague language, this left the definition of the term up to the responders. However, they did not give racism a definition. The results showed that 53 percent of the responses said “no,” 30 percent said “I do not know,” and 17 percent said “yes.”
“I find [the results] extremely encouraging for us as we move forward in terms of looking at ways of making this campus not just perceived as being less racist, but really being a place that is safe for all students who come here–that all students have a voice,” Williams said. Out of the 17 percent of students who responded “yes,” 39 percent were black, 17 percent were Asian, 12 percent were white and 12 percent were Hispanic. Out of all the students who participated, 133 were male and 288 were female. “Obviously there is a disparity in the perceptions by ethnicity,” Williams said. “When we look at it in terms of ethnicity, we have one ethnicity whose perceptions of this being a racist school is statistically significantly higher than the others.” Now that Williams and her research team have the results of their survey, they are diving into the qualitative phase. They are analyzing the results of the
written portion of the survey according to gender, race and ethnicity to try to find themes throughout the answers. Kenzie Trupp, Steven Metott, Zakeya Sisco, Ryan Roberts, Amanda Reed, Mike Hastilow and Kristi Young are a mixture of undergraduate and graduate students and have all been a part of Williams’ research team. They have helped Williams through either conducting and/ or analyzing the research. This research is a result of the apology of Southern’s president, Dave Smith, regarding the perceived racism throughout Southern’s history. “I want to applaud the courage of the administration of Southern Adventist University, particularly Dr. Smith, in taking a bold step and making public something that people often times sweep under the rug and do not think about,” Williams said. “I am so pleased to be part of a university that has that kind of courage.”
Many students may believe that meal plan is set in stone and unable to be changed. However, the Village Market (VM) is slightly flexible with the items on their meal plan. As a grocery store, the VM encourages feedback from their customers, especially students, to improve service. “Students can request most single serve items to be added to meal plan,” said VM purchaser Nick Johnson. “As long as it gets approved by Southern, it can be placed on the VM meal plan.” The Village Market offers a large variety of options for the meal plan. Anything marked with a green “MP” sticker applies to meal plan. However, items currently in the store that are not on meal plan cannot be added. The item, like a particular brand of chips, has to be a new item introduced to the store.
“Students can request most single serve items to be added to meal plan.”
Village Market manager Jackie Rose mentioned that not a lot of students request new items. It is a shame because the VM has so much to offer regarding meal plan. “I did not know that you could request items,” said sophomore business administration major Cameron Hodges. “I would love for them to carry kombucha.” To request an item that is currently not in the store, the VM recommends personally talking to their purchaser, Nick Johnson. He can be contacted from the main office or can be found throughout the store during the day.
New Physical Therapy Assistant Program to start January 2019 Madison Gang Staff Writer Southern Adventist University’s new Physical Therapy Assistant (PTA) Program will begin Jan. 2019. PTA Program Director Chris Stewart said the program is in its final stages of the initial accreditation process. Fifteen student interviews were held last week, and acceptance letters were sent out last Thursday, Sept. 27. Students admitted into the program are scheduled
to begin their first classes in Jan. and graduate in Dec. of 2019. Stewart said that the future goal is to accept 40 PTA students. “From last I heard, as far as incoming freshmen, roughly around 60 or so have picked PTA as their career of choice. So the numbers will increase substantially,” Stewart said. Southern will be the only other Seventh-day Adventist school besides Loma Linda University to have a PTA program. See PTA page 2
The new Physical Therapy Assistant program is located in the Fleming Plaza. Photo by Tierra Hayes
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