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By Leonardo Guaquirian RiveraDaily Staff Writer

The Brazilian-Portuguese Association and Cordão de Ouro-Capoeira DMS host-ed the first Brazilian Day. The celebration started with a series of Brazilian art work-shops in 196 Forker. At night, live perfor-mances, a traditional Brazilian dinner and a party took place from 7:30 p.m. to 2 a.m. at the Unitarian Church, 1015 N. Hyland Ave.

Cordão de Ouro-Capoeira masters taught participants the basic steps and moves of capoeira, a Brazilian martial art. More than 30 people, including adults and children, attended the workshop. Re-peatedly, the crowd practiced in lines and moved around the room in circles.

The professors also broke down the audience in small groups to teach them different steps more efficiently and taught them to sing in Portuguese to enhance their dances.

The participants didn’t stop until their steps were all synchronized and well done. They paired up and interacted with each other while dancing samba. Mauro Valadão, president and professor of the Cordão de Ouro-Capoeira group, made sure that everybody in the crowd knew the importance of capoeira, which he referred to as a chance to be connected through martial arts and dances.

Valadão emphasized that the partici-pants did not have to adapt to capoeira because it would always adapt to them instead.

Children also danced and interacted with the capoeiristas. Sage Halfaill-Boone, 7, came from Des Moines to participate in the workshop. “My favorite part of capoeira is the dance. I did it in 2009, and I’m doing it again this year,” she said.

Pedro Maduro and Mauro Valadão en-tertained the guests throughout the night and presented all the performances at the party, which included various forms of dança-afro performances.

Five girls dressed in colorful costumes welcomed the crowd with claps and danced, followed by another group of male dancers with shields in their hands and acted as if they were getting ready to fight.

One of the dances was performed in honor of a Brazilian warrior named Mac-ulele, who fought until death and defended his tribe using only two sticks. Three more girls in brief but picturesque outfits with feathers on their heads encouraged the au-dience to sing and clap to the rhythm of the music, along with the rest of the dancers and the percussion band. All the capoeri-stas, including Halfaill-Boone, performed as well.

Lucas Mutti, junior in mechanical en-

By Karuna AngDaily Staff Writer

Neither Jeffery Johnson, president of the ISU Alumni Association, nor President Gregory Geoffroy can buy an ISU class ring. Surprising?

When the class ring was reintro-duced again to Iowa State in 2003, the student committee that was formed to help define the class ring stood strongly on the principle of not allowing stu-dents who have less than 60 credit hours — or 30 credits for transfer or graduate students — to buy the ring.

Johnson, who is not a graduate of Iowa State, cannot get a class ring. He did try to see if the student committee would let him have a class ring.

“I told them, ‘I would pay for it,’” he said. “The students on the committee said no.”

The decision made by the student

committee was to maintain the integ-rity of the ring, Johnson said.

The ring has a deep meaning for students who graduate from Iowa State; it symbolizes one’s journey at Iowa State and the completion of the journey, explained Scott Dahl, direc-tor of membership and marketing of ISUAA.

Students wanted to be able to cus-tomize their own ring, by putting their initials on it or their girlfriend’s initials on it, and the ring has lost some of its original meaning, Dahl said.

“It is a representation of your time at Iowa State,” he stated.

The tradition of getting class rings at Iowa State was fading away, and there was only 20-35 ring sales a year, Dahl said. That became one of the reasons to initiate the program to reintroduce the class rings.

“Students are only going to be stu-

dents for four years and maybe gradu-ate school,” Johnson said.

“But they are going to be alumni for life, and they also need to interface with other alums.”

Having a class ring will allow one to have an instant connection with other people when one looks at the ring, Johnson said.

That was one of the pushing forces behind the project.

A group of students, faculty, staff, university administrators and alumni became part of a committee to help choose what represents Iowa State best.

“It was across the board from fac-ulty, staff, alumni and students that the Campanile had to be the central sym-bol,” Johnson said.

The traditions included in the ring are the Campanile; Beardshear and Curtiss halls; 1858, the year Iowa State was founded; the university swans; the

Cyclone banner; the university’s motto, “Science with Practice”; and the words “True and Valiant,” from the alma ma-ter song, “The Bells of Iowa State.”

There are a few options that stu-dents can choose from. The ring is

available in white or yellow gold with an option of diamond or ruby. Engravings are allowed on the inside of the ring.

Students can get their class rings at ISU Book store or at ISUAA’s Web site, www.isualum.org/services/ring.

By Tessa CallenderDaily Staff Writer

For members of fraternities and sororities, Greek Week, which will take place from April 5-11, marks the time of the year when approximately 2,300 students help others, make new friendships and show their pride.

“It’s definitely something that a lot of greek houses really look forward to as a big spring event, and something that they work toward and take a lot of pride in,” said Kevin Peyton, senior in agricultural engineering, member of FarmHouse fraternity and general co-chairman for the Greek Week Central Committee the last two years.

“It gets to be a really exciting time. Throughout the week, there are many activities — all designed to bring the greek community together and sort of have an opportunity for people to show off what they’ve got.”

Greek Week gives the members of the greek community the opportunity to join together and celebrate with a week full of exciting competitions and awards, all while encompassing this year’s theme, “Pride We Share in the Letters We Wear.”

Greek Week includes an abundant assortment of activities, including the can drive, soup label and box top collecting, the blood drive and Lip Sync contest.

All of the Greek Week activities the students par-take in before or during the event earn them credit

for overall Greek Week points, with 13 fraternity-sorority pairings battling competitively to take the top spot.

Community service is a big part of this tradition-al event, as well as the greek community’s way of life in general. The funds donated from the can drive are donated to local nonprofit organizations, and the soup labels and box tops the chapters accumu-late are donated to the Ames Community School District, which enables the schools to purchase ed-ucational supplies. There are three collection dates for these items within a three-week period before Greek Week starts.

Last year, Greek Week raised $5,850 after they collected 186,218 cans, and donated 17,888 box tops for education labels.

“Our pairing has held multiple days where we sit around and sort cans, and we are getting together soon to work on box tops and soup labels,” said Stephanie Andrews, junior in pre-journalism and mass communication and member of Kappa Delta sorority. “We collect cans, box tops and soup labels all year long, so hopefully it pays off.”

Another big community service event students partake in is the Polar Bear Plunge, which raised a total of $38,211 last year. During the event, which takes place the Saturday of Greek Week, partici-pants will jump into a chilly Lake LaVerne to raise money for the Special Olympics of Iowa.

“It’s packed; groups of 40 people, ready to jump in,” said Alex Ryan, general co-chairman of the

Greek Week Central Committee, senior in agricul-tural engineering and member of Alpha Gamma Rho fraternity. “Each group of jumpers turns in a theme and provides a song as they jump to incor-porate creativity.”

Polar Bear Plunge is an event open to anyone who would like to participate, greek or not. Each person is required to raise a minimum of $60.

Other service events the greek community has a chance to participate in to obtain points include the blood drive, Relay for Life, Veishea Service Day and a food drive can sculpture contest.

Each pairing will enter a group into the Lip Sync contest, which requires them to prepare a skit com-posed of different songs and a plot to go along with the Greek Week’s theme.

“Lip Sync is unique from all other events that the greek community participates in because it is a five- to eight-minute skit, where the groups must show why going greek is a great choice,” said Jessal-ynn Nguyen, Greek Week Central coordinator of Lip Sync and junior in biology from Chi Omega soror-ity. “They dance and act without using their voices, making it a tricky task to portray themselves and be within the time limit.”

“It’s fun to see the combinations and the ex-cerpts from songs that they pull out,” Peyton said.

The Lip Sync competition is similar to Varieties, but a little less strenuous and doesn’t take as long

March 30, 2010, Volume 204 >> Number 126 >> 40 cents >> iowastatedaily.com >> An independent newspaper serving Iowa State since 1890 TUESDAY

Celebration

Class rings were so heavily customized to suit student’s taste that it slowly lost its meaning of symbolizing a student’s journey at Iowa State. A set of traditions that symbolize Iowa State was chosen by a committee of students and are engraved in the current class ring design. Photo: Karuna Ang/Iowa State Daily

ISU tradition connects alumni everywhereClass Rings

Culture

Brazilian Day celebrates life with dance

see CAPOEIRA on PAGE 3

Settingthestagefor

Greek Week

Tau Kappa Epsilon, Kappa Alpha Theta and Lambda Chi Al-pha practice their Lip Sync routine Wednes-day for Greek Week. There are 13 different pairings of fraternities and sororities par-ticipating in Greek Week. Photo: Joseph Bauer/Iowa State Daily

see GREEK on PAGE 12

Be preparedSee what to keep in

your car in case of an emergency

see AUTOS on PAGE 8

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