By Matt Stiver staff reporter Amy Shackleford, a senior business major and three-year orientation student adviser, received a shock when she received a letter in the mail last Friday. Beginning the 2000-01 school year, the freshman and new student orientation program will use an entirely new staff of student advisers. Seventeen others also received the letter. "We had no idea that was coming," Shackleford said. "I think it's unfortunate that the administration would make such a drastic decision to one of the most stellar programs on this campus without having any student input." Kay Higgins, director of new student affairs, mailed all current advisers a letter informing them they would not be allowed to be an OSA in Summer 2000. Advisers assist students during the orientation program by helping prepare them for college life at TCU and giving them advice. Ben Wilkinson, a senior pre-med and business major, said he was surprised at the news. He served as an adviser in 1997-98 and has been a resident assistant since 1997. "The emphasis on orientation staff is that we are a family," Wilkinson said. "Orientation is an incredible program. The bonding that happens between the advisers and the students is an incredible experience. It's a shock because it's different from how it has been for so long."
Don Mills, vice chancellor for student affairs, said the move was made to include more students in the orientation program. "I know the number of students who can be advisers is diminished when you have students being advisers for two and three years," Mills said. "(The change) was aimed to bring some new blood into the program. Nobody was relieved of a job because nobody had a job at the moment." Higgins said the decision was intended to give current advisers more options. "The concern was students getting all the opportunities," she said. "Every year during the selection process, there are numerous students who are devastated because they'll never get the chance to, in this case, have the orientation experience. There are so many leadership opportunities (at TCU). One of the interests was that students could look at other opportunities." But Shackleford said orientation did not prevent her from having other leadership activities. "Everything that I wanted to do, I was able to do," she said. "If it conflicted, then I worked with that, or I had to make a decision. Orientation was the one I chose because it's my first love. Anything that would have kept me from (being an adviser) would have been off campus." Higgins said orientation usually requires 18 student advisers and about 35 to 50 percent of those return to participate again the following year. Time constraints and pressure on students led to the reorganization, she said. "Frog Camp runs concurrent with orientation, so (advisers) cannot be Frog Camp facilitators because they happen at the same time," Higgins said. "Students have expressed disappointment over the years that they couldn't do both. There have been some discussions at the beginning of the year that it's very stressful to be an orientation adviser and an RA at the same time." Shackleford, who also serves as an RA, said being both an adviser and an RA has benefits for freshmen. "I think it's a real asset for an RA staff to have an orientation adviser, especially in a freshman residence hall because during registration, orientation advisers get extensive training in enrollment," she said. "Being an RA and having the skills I learned from orientation, which transfer to the RA position, helped me advise freshmen with schedules and advising." Higgins said the new ruling will not affect a large number of students. "There are people who have an opinion or have an emotional concern, but they are graduating seniors," she said. "There are a lot of students on campus, and the number of students who might have came back is not that large." Shackleford said returning advisers helped her during her first session as an orientation adviser. "I can't imagine getting through my first year without returning advisers," she said. "They were important for basic logistical things like where you needed to be and when and how to make the program run and then just having somebody to look up to as far as keeping the unity of the staff." Wilkinson also said returning advisers were important his first year. "When I heard there weren't going to be any returning advisers, I kind of wondered how (orientation) was going to work out," he said. "There's going to have to be a lot of work put into the orientation program if this is the final decision."
Matt Stiver
By Justin Roche staff reporter Two TCU students were robbed early Wednesday morning by two armed gunmen in a parking lot behind the TCU Bookstore. The students, a man and a woman, were sitting in a parked car at 1 a.m. when they were approached by two men carrying automatic hand guns. The suspects demanded money and then drove east on West Bowie Street in a light blue, older-model vehicle, according to TCU police officers. The amount of money taken was not known Wednesday night. The Fort Worth and TCU police departments were contacted by the female student at 10 a.m. Wednesday. The suspects were described as two males, each between the ages of 25 and 30, between 5 feet 11 inches and 6 feet tall and about 185 pounds. One of the suspects was reported wearing a light blue University of North Carolina jersey, dark blue pants and a blue hat. The other suspect was wearing a dark navy-blue shirt, dark blue pants and a blue cap, according to TCU police officials. Wednesday morning's incident was the second armed robbery in the area behind the bookstore in the past week. On Nov. 5, two women were approached by a man who demanded they give him money. The suspect took $4 and a cellular phone and then got into a white or light blue older-model vehicle, occupied by two passengers, and drove away, according to a police report. The suspect in the Nov. 5 incident was wearing a white sports jacket and had the same physical characteristics as one of the suspects in Wednesday morning's robbery, TCU Sgt. JC Drake said. Drake said the Nov. 5 incident was reported to FWPD because it did not occur on TCU property. On Wednesday TCU police sent e-mail message to all faculty, students and staff, alerting them about that morning's robbery. Drake said officers planned to place fliers about the incident in residence halls and hand them out to students to increase awareness on campus. "This isn't the extent of what we can do," he said. "But for now, we want the students to be informed about what happened." Drake said patrol of the area will be increased by both FWPD and TCU police officers for about the next 10 days. "We want to make sure we're seen in the area," he said. Anyone with information about either of the robberies can contact the FWPD storefront at 923-1720 or TCU police at 257-7777. Information can also be submitted anonymously online at (www.cap.tcu.edu/Anonymous.html).
Justin Roche
By Alan Melson staff reporter Despite several recent incidents of crime close to campus, the neighborhood immediately around TCU is considered a "moderately high" crime area, according to results of a nation-wide survey released Wednesday. The 1999 College Community Crime Risk Assessment survey, conducted by a public safety Web site, APBnews.com, and a crime statistics analysis firm, CAP Index Inc., ranked TCU as 374 out of 1,497 American four-year colleges and universities. TCU was assigned a risk rating of eight out of 10, which is considered a "moderately high" risk factor in the survey. TCU Assistant Chief of Police J. C. Williams said he questions how accurately the statistics reflect the TCU community. "I think you'd be able to better assess this kind of thing if you worked with a school or lived near it," he said. Two other Dallas/Fort Worth area private schools were ranked more high-risk than TCU. Southern Methodist University, located in a Dallas neighborhood that is demographically similar to the neighborhood around TCU, ranked 174 in the survey with a risk rating of nine, which is considered a "high" risk factor. Texas Wesleyan University, located in an economically disadvantaged neighborhood in southeast Fort Worth, ranked at 134, also with a risk factor of "high." The university with the highest risk factor was Morris Brown College, a small liberal-arts college located in urban Atlanta. Many of the colleges that finished at the top of the survey are located in inner-city, urban areas. Since the survey results were made public to school administrators, several "high-risk" schools have questioned the validity of the survey. The only school in Texas to rank in the top 25 schools with a crime risk was the University of Houston, which was ranked at 25. Wendy Adair, associate vice chancellor/associate vice president for university relations at the University of Houston, said in a statement that the school believes the survey is not completely accurate. "We believe that there is a real flaw in the conclusions drawn from (the) study," Adair wrote. "(The) CAP Index is based on the assumption that it is safer in rural areas than in cities. We can say today that our students are as safe here as they are on most other university campuses." Robert Friedmann, a professor at Georgia State University, which also ranked in the top 25 high-risk schools, called the study "almost snake oil." While some are discontent with the findings, most of the administrators at the schools listed as high risk said they are continually working to improve security and safety through neighborhood involvement. "We are neither satisfied nor complacent about what (safety) we have attained, and we will continue to work hard to prevent crime from occurring on our university campus," Adair said. Williams said TCU Police officials are continually working to improve safety and reduce crime in the area. Crime, however, has remained relatively low due to successful partnerships with the Fort Worth Police Department and neighborhood watch groups. "I think that TCU is definitely a safer place to go than SMU or other similarly sized campuses in metropolitan areas like Fort Worth," Williams said. Sgt. J. C. Drake, who oversees training and administrative services for the TCU Police Department, said the department will continue to keep the community informed of incidents via e-mail messages, Web sites and fliers placed around campus.
Alan Melson
By Matt Welnack staff reporter In remembrance of American prisoners of war and soldiers missing in action, Air Force ROTC cadets will stand guard over a single-lit candle for 24 hours to celebrate Veteran's Day today. "It is a more visible way to remember the POWs and what they have done and the sacrifices they have made," said cadet colonel Todd Guest, a senior political science major. "It's one thing to die for your country, but it's another thing to be tortured and then die for your country." Leon Horowitz, a World War II POW, will begin the event at 3:30 p.m. in Sid W. Richardson Building, Lecture Hall 1, with a talk about his experiences in a POW camp. The Arnold Air Society, AFROTC's service organization, is the main group coordinating the Remembrance ceremony. The vigil, which will take place in front of Sadler Hall, will begin with the raising of the POW/MIA flag. About 80 to 90 cadets will voluntarily take 15-minute intervals watching over the candle while standing at attention with their rifles. "I think it is a privilege to honor all the POWs and those who are still missing in action who put forth the efforts and sacrifices that allow a military man like me to be a part of the greatest military on earth," Maj. John Folmar said. Guest, one of the cadets instrumental in planning the ceremony, said people need to be reminded of the sacrifices soldiers have made for the United States. "It's an awareness issue because they paid for our freedom with, not just death, but with torture and death," he said. "(Students) will appreciate their freedom more when they see what other soldiers have done for it." Capt. Jose Aleman said the nation needs to know how it secured its freedom. "It's important that we do (the Remembrance ceremony) throughout the country because the young people need to know that their freedom comes at a price," he said. "(The soldiers) have sacrificed a lot, and we should pay tribute to the POWs and MIAs." Aleman said cadets will benefit from hearing Horowtiz speak because he will give an insight into military life. "I think most of them will try hard to relate to the experiences that (Horowitz) went through," Aleman said. "It serves as a basis in building a starting point for them in starting a military career." A military tent will be set up in front of Sadler Hall to display memorabilia from POW camps. One of the displays will feature memorabilia from the 1937 Nanjing Massacre, during which 731 Americans were slaughtered in a POW camp. Another display will showcase POWs from Desert Storm. Guest said students can also find information about the Adopt-a-POW program, which encourages people to lobby their congressman or woman to increase efforts to bring bodies back from overseas.
Matt Welnack
By Matt Welnack staff reporter A male wearing a pair of bright pink women's pajamas to class. A female doing yoga in The Main. These are just two examples of deviance found by students in an introductory sociology class taught by Keith Whitworth, an occasional sociology faculty member. Deviance, Whitworth said, is defined as any behavior or physical appearance that departs from the norms and expectations of a group. About 200 students in his class were assigned to find 20 examples of deviance in non-participation research on campus in mid-September. Whitworth compiled a list of more than 4,000 examples from their findings.
Sean McGaughey, a sophomore premajor, said he benefited from the study because it was a different way to learn. "Getting outside of the classroom is a much better way to learn than sitting in a classroom listening to a lecture," McGaughey said. "(Our group) sat together and just looked around. It was an interesting way to learn." This was the third semester that Whitworth assigned a deviance study to his students. In that time, he has compiled more than 8,000 different examples of deviance at TCU. "Due to time constraints, an introductory sociology course only allows two or three classes to devote to research methods," Whitworth said. "Therefore, the 'learning-by-doing' assignment I assign is simplistic and designed to be practical." When Whitworth first came to TCU, he said he had some preconceived stereotypes about the students who attended TCU. But after seeing the results of the study, his attitudes have changed, he said. "I had certain stereotypes that students had a certain standard for dress and behavior on campus," Whitworth said. "As a result of this study, I have seen that there is greater deviance from the norms on campus than I had projected." Whitworth said he has seen patterns from the past three semesters' findings. The most significant ones are directly related to appearance, such as piercing, hair color and shaved heads, he said. Students found other examples, such as females wearing extremely short skirts, a female wearing a dog collar and a male with at least 10 piercings on his face. Other examples of deviant behavior include using fake IDs, consuming alcohol on campus, stealing food from The Main and wearing sunglasses inside a building. "I think it is unique because it provides a means of applying what (students) learn in a fun manner," Whitworth said. "It causes them to look for deviant behavior in their everyday setting and whether or not they fit in the norms and boundaries and the expectations on this campus."
Matt Welnack |
Wilkinson said he was looking forward to seeing what changes
were being made and that sometimes change can be positive.
"It gives the student an opportunity to do actual hands-on
research and apply the material that they're learning in the classroom
to a real life situation," Whitworth said. "In essence, they
become a sociologist."| The TCU Daily Skiff © 1998, 1999 Credits |