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Registering
by Remote
Tired of long registration
lines? Let your fingers do
the waiting: register by
telephone, as queue-weary stu
dents are doing from Iowa
State to Union CommunityCoI
lege in New Jersey. Comput
erized registration is in use or
about to be installed at 30 col
leges across the country, ac
cording to Perception Tech
nology, the Massachusetts firm
that introduced the system
lour years ago.
Armed with a complex
packet full of course code num
bers, students gain access to
their school’s computerized
registration system by punch
ing the appropriate keys on a
touch-tone telephone.
Coursescan Ik*chosen, added or
dropped simply by entering
the right codes. If the course* is
full or another problem
arises, a touch of a button can
bring a live operator on for
assistance. "This is really a
’have-it-your-way’ kind of
thing,” says Perception Tech
nology’s product-manage
ment director John E. Halde
man. "You're doing it where
and when you want.”
The process has not been en
im
"CHOICE"
tirely glitch-free, however.
When dost* to 20,000 students
first used the system last fall at
Texas A&M, the most com
mon complaint was a frequent
busy signal. "You have to get
in by luck,” said Michael Buck,
a freshman aerospace-engi
neering major, who tried to get
through to the computer for
two hours and then was cut off
twice. But most students sur
veyed loved the convenience.
As A&M junior David White
put it: "Kven when you're wait
ing with a busy signal you still
can eat or watch TV.” That’s
not easy to do in most registra
tion lines.
A Closer
Shave at BYU
Scrawling mustaches onto
paintings is nothing new,
but officials at Brigham
Young have pulled a reverse
twist. BYU’s administration
asked artist Ron Bell to de
whisker the portrait they had
commissioned of Karl (J.
Maeser, principal of Brigham
Young Academy (BYU’s prede
cessor). Maeser, who headed
the academy from 1876 to 1892,
was bearded in the old photo
graph from which Bell painted.
But since the hirsute ’60s,
beards have been banned at the
conservative Mormon cam
pus.'They thought it was a con
flict of codes,” says Bell, who
complied and gave his por
trait—done for the campus di
rectory—a closer shave.
Student leaders, however,
took the opportunity tocriticize
BYU rules, which prohibit
any hairstyle on chin or pate
that would draw "undue at
tention.” The story inspired a
special edition of the student
newspaper headlined censor
ship: IX)ES BYU HAVE A RE
STRAINING HAND?and attracted
unwelcome publicity off cam
pus. Both Bell and BYU said
the fuss was unwarranted.
"Everything made it appear
that I was violated as an artist,
and that just wasn’t tTue,” says
Boll. Those who want to see
what Maeser really looked like
in his hairy days, meanwhile,
can always visit the campus
statue that memorializes
him—beard intact.
Troubling stubble: BYUartist Bell with clean-cut Maeser
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Dealing With
Bomb Threats
Bomb threats are a fact of
life for many big institu
tions, but Oklahoma
State may have achieved some
sort of record: 44 threats in the
last five years. In addition to
disrupting classrooms and
dormitories, the threats carry a
hefty price tag—about
$330,000 in overtime pay for se
curity forces alone.
Officials at OSU say that
some of the threats are phoned
in by students who try to dis
rupt exams.Three years ago po
lice solved the case of a bomb
threat in the physical-sciences
classroom building after in
terviewing a professor who was
scheduled to give a test there
that day. When they found out
that one of his students was
failing the course, they ques
tioned him—and found their
culprit. Over the last five years,
police have arrested five stu
dents for making bomb threats;
all were convicted and paid
fines of at least $500.
Bomb threats have become
so common at OSU that offi
cials are reluctant to evacuate
a building unless they strongly
suspect that someone has
really planted a bomb—a policy
that makes many students un
easy. "The police are thinking
there’s only a one in a million
instance where a bomb exists,”
says senior journalism major
Greg Blanchard. "But I never
want to be in that minority.”
Duels Over
Divestment
Divestment campaigners
at Syracuse want to put
their money where their
mouths are. After denouncing
the board of trustees’ refusal
to completely divest holdings in
companies that do business in
South Africa, the Syracuse Stu
dent Government Association
announced it would police stu