Scanned and
Delivered
INSTEAD OF AMERICAN EXPRESS CARDS, STUDENTS AT
Old Dominion U., Va., shouldn’t leave home with
out their student IDs.
In January, two experimental
bar-code scanners that monitor stu
dent attendance were installed in
one of the campus’ large lecture
halls. Students are now required to
slide their student ID through the
scanner when entering and exiting
the room.
Right now, the new system
affects only those students taking
introductory science, psychology
and education classes in the lec
ture hall. Although 11 classes are
held in the 400-seat lecture hall,
only seven classes will be using the
scanner. However, Wayne
Edwards, general manager of aux
iliary services, says if the pilot test
ing this semester goes well, the
program will expand to other lec
ture halls on campus.
Getting carded.
Ralph Stevens, associate profes
sor of biology, came up with the
idea as a way to cut down on absen
teeism. “The goal is to build
responsibility,” he says. “It’s not to
force kids to go to class — it’s to
show them there are consequences
for not going.”
So far, students haven’t wel
comed the idea of being corralled
into the classroom.
“I’m offended by the idea of
being a number,” says sophomore
Jennifer Baise Fischer. “I don’t like
the idea of electronic tracking. It
makes me feel like I’m in a concen
tration camp.”
Other technical difficulties both
er students like senior Julie Flavell.
“I think it's a pain in the ass to actu
ally have to worry about having my
ID card ever)' day.”
Faculty support of the scan
ner is iffy, as well. “I’ll support
it as long as it doesn’t get in the
way and become too cumber
some getting students in and
out ot the classroom,” says
Robert Ake, associate professor
of chemistry.
Despite student disapproval,
Stevens hopes the new system will
reduce the 30 percent absenteeism
he faces daily in his classes.
“Students are going to spend
hours and hours trying to get
around this system,” he says.
“They should simply spend this
time studying.”
By Angelique Lopez, Old Dominion U.,
Va. / Photo by Will Bassett, ODU
Gordon, P.I.
SITTING IN SMOKE-FILLED ROOMS, WALKING THE
streets, paying off informants — that’s how we
picture private investigators. But after Eastern
Kentucky U. sophomore Kevin Gordon got his P.I.
license, he decided a jacket and baseball cap worked
better than a fedora and trench coat.
“Private investigators just need
to find the facts,” Gordon says.
Gordon’s transformation into
a private dick occurred after he
spent a summer investigating
insurance claims. By the time fall
rolled around, he was hooked.
“In the state of Kentucky', you
only nave to be
, 18 to get a
^ P.I. license,”
B he says.
J Once certi
/ fied, Gordon
placed an ad in
ms campus news
paper for his gumshoe services.
His price is $5 per hour ... plus
expenses, of course.
On one case, Gordon recov
ered stereos stolen from dorm
rooms (he found them at a pawn
shop). He’s also run two surveil
lances (or students who suspected
their boyfriends were cheating.
“But 1 don't do that for people 1
know,” he says. “It can get messy.”
Gordon says most of his cases
involve someone trying to find a
long-lost schoolmate or friend.
He says the Internet is the best
resource for these cases. “If you
have a name, you can get any
information.”
But not all of his clients are
strangers. A year ago Gordon told
his mom to put a red bow on a jar
of change and leave it in their
house. When his parents were
robbed recently, Gordon found a
local bank teller who remembered
a jar with a bow. Police watched
the bank surveillance tapes, iden
tified the suspects and recovered
the stolen property.
Gordon says the world of
private investigators is not as
glamorous as it is on television
and in movies, but he enjoys
searching for facts and solving
cases. And even what Gordon
calls the most boring part of the
job — surveillance — can have
its moments. Case in point:
Remember the students’
boyfriends? They were cheating.
By Oanetta Barker, Eastern Kentucky
U. / Photo by Donald Knight, Eastern
Kentucky U.
The P.I.: He sits, he waits, he watches.
Dead in
the Dumps
Burial at sea used to be a practice
of the Mafia and the U.S. Navy, but now
it appears that a university might have
gotten into the act.
UCLA's School of Medicine is being
sued for the improper disposal of up to
18,000 bodies donated for educational
purposes. A class-action lawsuit has
been filed on behalf of the relatives of
the donors charging UCLA with fraud,
negligence and breach of contract.
The lawsuit alleges that the bodies
were incinerated with medical waste,
including animal remains, scalpels,
needles, blood samples and aborted
fetuses. The ashes, some not fully cre
mated and still identifiable as human
tissue, were packaged in trash bags
and placed in a dumpster to be picked
up by city garbage trucks. Court docu
ments state: “Bags... were left to sit
and collect for years, until finally they
were taken to the Santa Monica Bay to
be dumped.”
The allegations first came to light in
1993 when a funeral-at-sea contractor
for UCLA found medical waste in a con
tainer of human remains.
Since the 1993 scandal, UCLA has
shut down its on-campus crematori
um and claims to have stopped mix
ing remains with medical waste. Still,
Mike Arias, the litigating attorney in
the case, estimates that his firm
receives about one phone call a day
from concerned family members.
“We do have a model program
here,” says Linda King, UCLA’s direc
tor of Health Sciences Communica
tions. Although the university has not
formally responded to the charges, the
school released a statement ensuring
donors that their bodies will be treated
with “dignity and compassion.”
The lawsuit alleges that UCLA has
broken such promises before.
By Hannah Miller, UCLA
• In January, the NCAA passed leg
islation which allows student-athletes
to hold part-time jobs. Athletes will be
allowed to earn the difference between
the amount of their scholarships and
the cost of attending their school. The
average difference is $2,000.
• In a case filed by three U. of Wis
consin, Madison, law students, a fed
eral judge deemed mandatory segre
gated student fees unconstitutional.
As a result, UW students no longer
have to contribute student fees to fund
campus organizations they don’t sup
port. A refund plan is being devised.
• The American Academy for Liber
al Education, a group of scholars who
advocate teaching Western culture
without all the political correctness,
granted its first accreditation to the U.
of Dallas. Rhodes College, Tenn., and
St. Thomas Aquinas College, N.Y., will
be reviewed for full accreditation this
month. The group is still investigating
Michigan State U.'s James Madison
College for accreditation.
• The National Association of Col
lege Stores (NACS) is investigating
instances of price discrimination by
some publishers. So far, NACS has
found that many midsize and smaller
publishers practice “dual pricing” —
where college stores pay 20 percent
more for books than regular book
sellers. The NACS says it’s considering
filing a lawsuit claiming this policy
violates federal antitrust laws.
• UCLA's Higher Education
Research Institute reports that more
college freshmen than ever before say
they selected their school for financial
reasons. According to the Institute’s
annual freshman survey, 33.1 percent
of the 1996 freshmen listed financial
assistance as a “very important” fac
tor in choosing a college.
• According to an Institute of
International Education study, the
number of American students study
ing abroad rose 10.6 percent to 84,403
in 1994-95, continuing a 10-year
upward trend. By contrast, foreign
enrollment in U.S. schools rose less
than 1 percent in the past two years.
• Trial Lawyers for Public Justice
is suing the NCAA, charging that
freshman-eligibility requirements
discriminate against black athletes.
The group has asked the court to bar
the NCAA from using the minimum
standardized test score cutoffs.
Lawyers argue that the cutoffs aren’t
based on valid research and don’t
accurately reflect educational poten
tial, especially of students who are
black or from socioeconomic back
grounds that left them unprepared
for college.
• Cissy Stehl is offering a
$75,000 reward to find out who killed
her son execution-style 12 years ago.
Richard Barron Bryan, a football
player at the U. of Alabama, was
shot, bound and thrown into the
Tombigbee River in 1984. No one
was arrested for the crime.