The
S TUDENT P RINTZ www.studentprintz.com
SERVING SOUTHERN MISS SINCE 1927
Tuesday, February 8, 2011
Volume 95 Issue 35
ON CAMPUS
Black and Gold going Green Jonathan Andrews Printz Writer
Eli Baylis/Printz
Johnathan Williams recently started his new position on campus as Southern Miss’s chief sustainabilty officer.
ON CAMPUS
Jonathan Williams has an ambitious plan for USM’s sustainability efforts, and as the new chief sustainability officer he has the opportunity to make those plans a reality. Williams, who has a bachelor’s degree in economics from Duke University and a law degree from Washington University, practiced law for two years but decided that it was not for him. “I did a combination of tax, finance and treasury work, then ended up doing more legal and compliance work in the past six or so years of my career,” Williams said. He said that living in California helped spur his interest in the sustainability industry. After he co-founded a nonprofit organization called the eMerging Careers Institute that focused on training students to function in emerging sustainability careers, Williams found his way to USM. “Then I happened to come back here on a business trip, where I met the dean at the business school who said ‘I like your background’, and I started teaching
some classes here,” Williams said. Williams said he started out teaching four or five classes in his early days here as a visiting professor in the School of Business. Now, as the chief sustainability officer at USM, he outlined his plan for the university’s green efforts in three main focuses. The first, which Williams said focuses on the campus, would ensure that USM meets carbon emissions standards and LEED energy efficiency standards for buildings (like the Century Park residence halls). He also mentioned a bicycle rental service like the now EcoEagle program, among other things. Williams said his goal was to improve all of the school’s sustainability or green efforts. “Even from the cafeteria’s standpoint,” Williams said. The second is the curriculum he plans to introduce through learning from other universities’ efforts. Williams said building the curriculum is a difficult process, since the industry is still so new. He said, “Every university isn’t doing this, and there isn’t a template that you can just cutand-paste.” Williams also said the scope of
all the things that make up “sustainability” was also an obstacle in building an effective curriculum. “It’s a very broad subject. Sustainability’s made up of everything from waste management to solar energy,” Williams said. He plans to work with Mississippi Power and other alternative fuel sources including a $5 Million solar energy farm that is coming to Hattiesburg. The final aspect, Williams said, of his three-part plan is the community. “The community is how we reach out to partner with other schools, other business and even the hospitals in the area,” Williams said, “Hattiesburg has a huge hospital business that we have to make sure is recycling.” Most importantly, Williams said, he wants to make sure USM students can get jobs. “I want them to be able to enter the green economy immediately… to make sure that they can get that access to work right out of school.” University President Martha Saunders is confident that Williams will be able to meet that
See GO GREEN, 3
Senate legislation proposes Internet control Legislation introduced in the Senate could give the White House the power to block or limit Internet traffic in the event of a “cybersecurity emergency.” The legislation, called the “Protecting Cyberspace as a National Asset Act,” was put forth by Sen. Joe Lieberman (ID-Conn.), along with Sen. Susan Collins (R-Me.) and Tom Carper (D-De.) and has caused an uproar on blogs and news websites
with cries of censorship. The timing of the bill is a major factor in the distaste for it. It was brought up the same day Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak shut down Internet access amid widespread protests and demands that he leave office. Jessie Pennypacker, a senior history major from Navarre, Fla., said the censoring of information from the federal government, such as in Egypt, violates basic human rights. “Censoring information is wrong,” Pennypacker said. “Education and the exchange of infor-
mation is a right to everyone. The free flow of information should not hindered.” The act, though not intentioned to quell rebellion, would try to give the executive branch the power to stop at least some of that free flow of information should the security of the nation be threatened through the Internet. Allan McBride, chair of the department of political science said that traditionally, the government plays a limited role in
DISTURBED
COLD FASHION
BASEBALL
Jonathan Andrews Printz Writer
See INTERNET, 3
Illustration by Eli Baylis and Christopher Bostick/Printz
WEATHER Tuesday
54/29 Wednesday
59/32 Thursday
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INDEX Calendar ......................... 2 Sudoku............................2 News ...............................3 Arts & Entertainment .......4 Feature ............................5 Opinion............................6 Sports.............................. 7