Black and Gold Pageant highlights Page 7

Independent Student Newspaper for the University of Texas at San Antonio

March 9, 2010 Volume 42 • Issue 9 • 12 Pages

Letter to the Editor: Isn’t porn illegal on campus? Page 5

Comic: Hop on Board the shuttle Page 5

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Women’s basketball suffers defeat, Page 11

Paisano-Online com

Senator awarded Women’s Advocate of the Year award

Nicole Beltranpaisanonews@sbcglobal.net

On March 3, the University of Texas System Board of Regents ap-proved tuition and fee increases for the next two years for nine UT sys-tem institutions, including UTSA. Tuition will increase 4.5 percent, or $366 a year for full-time students. The increase will be effective begin-ning Fall 2010.

Right now, students taking 12 hours pay $3,208.70 in tuition and fees. With the increase, those same students will pay $3,574.70 by Fall 2010 and about $4,400 by Fall 2011.

The University of Texas System regents have voted to increase tu-ition at the flagship Austin campus by 5.4 percent this fall.

According to the Austin Ameri-can-Statesman, in-state undergrad-uates at the University of Texas at Austin will pay an average of $4,709 per semester for tuition and fees in 2010-11 and $4,892 the following

academic year. The present tuition and fees total averages $4,468 per semester.

All typical fees that full-time stu-dents pay will increase. Commuter parking permits will increase to $105 in fiscal year 2011 and $130 in fiscal year 2012. A little over $1.5 million will be reserved for financial aid, a requirement the legislature made for the institutions requesting an increase in designated tuition.

“The decision on how the money is going to be allocated has not been made because the board just ap-proved it,” Associate Vice President for Financial Affairs Janet Parker said.

UTSA may be facing a $10 million budget cut next year. According to Parker, some of the money from the increase will be beneficial so that the university will not have to cut fac-ulty and staff. However, if the budget cut is not as severe as proposed, the money will be used for hiring new faculty and staff and advancing the

strategic initiative to propel UTSA to a tier one status.

Josh Bart, Student Government Association secretary, said that, though he does not like increases in fees, he can understand why they are necessary.

“I’m a firm believer in freezing tu-ition and fees, especially while in re-cession, but I also recognize that the increase has a payoff: paying more now means that my degree will be worth more when we reach tier one in the future.”

Senior biology major Micah Her-nandez said that an increase in tu-ition should also include an increase in financial aid to keep college af-fordable.

“I think it is unfortunate that a lot of students have to work to make ends meet. I see this as a necessary evil in the growth of our university,” she said.

Tui t ion increases

Movie Review: Alice in Wonderland

Senator Leticia Van de Putte has won various awards. UTSA presented her the Woman’s Advocate of the Year award.

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Evan Anderspaisanonews@sbcglobal.net

Senator Leticia Van de Putte was presented with the Women’s Advo-cate of the Year Award, March 1, at the kickoff ceremony celebrating Women’s History Month. Van De Putte was selected for the award by the Women’s Studies Institute for her continual efforts to “write women back into history.” The key-note address was delivered by Dr. Elena Gutierrez, who stressed the importance of women and the vital roles they serve.

Van De Putte complimented UTSA and the Women’s Institute. She pointed out that UTSA has recognized the power of a woman as evident with the university’s fe-male athletic director and dean of the college of business—positions strongly dominated by males.

Van De Putte continued by ad-dressing the increasing respon-sibility of the modern woman in the “sandwich generation,” which describes the task of caring for the grandparents of a family as well as the children.

This added responsibility placed on the “sandwich generation” in-creases the need for education which the Senator stressed cannot be interrupted by the “systemic discrimination” that may linger in Texas schools.

Gutierrez spoke about the sig-nificance of reproductive justice.

A published author on the subject, she provided two stories to view reproductive justice in a broader context. One was about a woman named Rosie Hernandez.

Hernandez died from an infection caused by an unsterilized abortion. Hernandez had the money to pay for a legal abortion, but the schol-arship money that she would have to use would have kept her from going to college that next semester. She felt that she would have to sac-rifice her safety in order to escape the poverty she knew all her life.

Gutierrez then made it evident that cases similar to Hernandez’s could become even more com-mon. Comprehensive reproductive health care is an issue included in the controversial healthcare reform bill.

A proposed option would pro-hibit use of federal funds to cover abortion; as a result, millions of women would lose the privilege to get an abortion, subjecting women to secondary healthcare.

Gutierrez believes all options should be guaranteed to women and men no matter their economic background. She urged people to educate their friends, family and colleagues on the issues that are at stake in Washington D.C., “sharing one’s own story can help to create an inclusive environment which will be the platform of change.”

Students will have the opportunity to vote on a proposed fee increase of $10 to improve shuttle services.

If the transportation fee referendum does not pass, reductions will continue to occur in shuttle transportation services.

Even if the fee increase is approved, surrounding apartment complexes will still be required to pay a fee, although Business Auxiliary Services Transpor-tation Services Manager James Strahan said that the fee may be less than the $10,000 currently required. Off-campus complexes that elect not to pay will continue to not receive shuttle services at their location. Although services have already been reduced, if more reductions are needed, route 41 and 43 may lose a shuttle bus.

“We will have to cut services where they are right now. I cannot maintain the service with the current budget,” Strahan said.

Transportation Fee vote is March 9-10

UT System Board of Regents approve an increase of n ine percent over two years

Chelsea Harbinpaisanonews@sbcglobal.net

Governor Rick Perry has ordered all public institutions, including uni-versities, to prepare for a five percent cut in their state appropriated budget for the next two years. UTSA presi-dent Ricardo Romo said the impend-ing cut, an estimated $9.8 million, will not result in layoffs for UTSA faculty and staff.

“We’re not cutting any services and we’re not cutting staff,” Romo said. “That to me is the most dramatic reac-tion. I will not contemplate layoffs.”

While several other colleges in the UT system, including UT Austin, have announced they will be laying off fac-ulty and staff in order to satisfy the five percent cut, UTSA Provost Dr. John Frederick explained that UTSA can survive without losing any employees.

“Every year we get a little bit of ex-panded revenue from the fact that enrollment grows and tuition and fees increase,” Frederick said. “What we are estimating in additional revenues for next year is greater than the $9.8 mil-lion, so a lot of the way we are plan-ning on handling the reduction is by

using these additional revenues to fill the gap.”

Though no layoffs are expected, Frederick explained that no addition-al faculty or staff will be hired. With student enrollment projected to grow by two percent next fall, no new hires means more students for the same number of faculty.

Frederick noted that recently most of UTSA’s growth is in student reten-tion, suggesting that upper division classes are likely to experience larger student to faculty ratios.

“Some of the additional revenues that were coming in would have been

used to hire additional faculty and staff, and yes, we could certainly use them. Again, we don’t have to cut anyone; we are just foregoing some expansion op-portunities,” Frederick said.

Frederick also explained that UTSA could save $3 million by not giving merit raises to professors.

“We want to handle the budget re-duction as much as possible by looking at parts of our expenses that we can cut without affecting our core mis-sion, which depends on the employ-ees we have right now,” Frederick said. “We can’t make predictions about the economy, but at least for now we don’t foresee any staff cutbacks.”

Regardless, official action cannot be taken until the Texas legislature meets in 11 months to decide on whether the statewide five percent budget cut should be implemented.

“We have to hold the money in re-serve in the event that there is a bud-get cut, and if there is not or it isn’t as severe as we projected, we might be able to restore some things into the budget,” Frederick said. “Basically, we are in a holding pattern until the legis-lature acts.”

What do budget cuts mean for UTSA?“We’re not cutting any services and we’re not cutting staff.”Ricardo RomoUTSA President

Associated Press

An Indiana University student has distributed stickers pronouncing “I am coal'' around the world in what she calls “smart vandalism'' to raise aware-ness of climate-change issues.

Junior Cristina Vanko enlisted fami-ly and friends worldwide to affix 1,000

stickers to electrical fixtures, illumi-nated displays and other structures as part of a class in art, engagement and activism.

The stickers have appeared in U.S. cities including Bloomington, Chi-cago, San Francisco and New York and internationally in Europe, South America, New Zealand and even

Iraq.“It's like a little piece of me – every-

where,'' Vanko told The Herald-Times of Bloomington.

Vanko's class is part of The Canary Project, a New York-based program that uses visual media, events and art-work to build public understanding of climate change issues.

Student vandalizes for a good cause

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March 9, 2010The Paisano2 News

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Associated Press

Colleen McHugh, appointed a Uni-versity of Texas System regent in 2005 by Gov. Rick Perry, has been elected as the board’s first chairwoman.

Regents on Wednesday unanimous-ly chose the 63-year-old attorney and hospital executive from Corpus Chris-ti, who had been vice chairwoman, to lead the panel at a time of increasing budget challenges.

The UT System has 15 academic and health campuses, about 200,000 students and more than 84,000 em-ployees.

“I know the board is committed to following through on the initiatives begun during the last several years and reaffirming its shared commitment to transparency and excellence,’’ McHugh said in a statement. “Our work remains unchanged: ensuring that the Univer-sity of Texas System serves our stu-dents, the people of Texas and the na-tion well.’’

McHugh succeeds banker James Huffines of Austin, who in late 2009 announced he would no longer serve as chairman but would remain on the governing panel.

Regents on Wednesday approved a tuition hike for the flagship UT cam-

pus in Austin totaling 5.4 percent this fall and nearly 3.9 percent for the 2011-2012 period. Regents overall approved tuition increases at all of the system’s campuses except for a health campus in Tyler that has no students.

McHugh earned her undergradu-ate degree from Southern Methodist University in Dallas and her law de-gree from St. Mary’s University in San Antonio. She is a vice president for compliance, risk management and pri-vacy with the Christus Spohn Health System.

Her term as a regent is scheduled to expire Feb. 1, 2011.

First chairwoman of UT Board of Regents serves until 2011 Associated Press

Swastikas, nooses, a Ku Klux Klan hood, graffiti, epithets and jeers.

An ugly spate of bias incidents has struck several University of California campuses over the past month, caus-ing consternation, outcry and fear that bigotry is alive among the young and educated.

Students have protested and ad-ministrators have condemned, but the question remains of what lies be-hind the sudden parade of prejudice – a growing climate of insensitivity on campuses or a bunch of immature kids yearning for peer acceptance and at-tention.

“My guess is some of all of those things,’’ said interim UC Provost Law-rence H. Pitts. “I’d like to believe it’s re-ally an extreme minority. It does sug-gest there’s some underlying feeling of intolerance in our community.’’

The incidents have roiled several campuses in the 175,000-student state university system, which is one of the nation’s most respected and diverse.

At UC San Diego, black students were offended by an off-campus “Compton Cookout’’ party that mocked ghetto stereotypes, a noose and Ku Klux Klan-style hood found on campus and a student making racially derogatory remarks on a student-run TV station.

At UC Davis, swastikas cropped up and the gay and lesbian center was van-dalized with graffiti. At UC Santa Cruz, a picture of a noose was scrawled. On the Irvine campus, the Israeli ambas-sador was heckled to the extent that he was forced to end a speech early.

The acts were particularly shocking because they occurred on university campuses _ usually considered centers of intellectual enlightenment above

acts commonly associated with igno-rance.

But experts note that universities are microcosms of society at large, and that includes hatemongers. Upticks in hate crimes are often seen in times of economic malaise as people seek scapegoats, noted Jack Levin, a North-eastern University sociologist who has studied hate.

Still, surveys show that prejudice among today’s young people is at a low and interracial and interethnic mar-riages are at an all-time high, said Tom Smith, director of the general social survey at the National Opinion Re-search Center. Studies have also long found that education increases toler-ance of different groups, he added.

“College students, as a group, are quite liberal on this issue,’’ Smith said.

Minority students said that’s why they’re galled that fellow students to-day would even think that something like hanging a noose in a library is funny or acceptable. The school paper later published a letter of apology from a female student who wrote that she had only been playing with a rope, ac-cidentally left in the library and did not mean to offend.

“Part of the problem is that people don’t realize it’s insensitive,’’ said Joelle Gamble, a student at the University of California, Los Angeles. ``They see it as free speech.’’

Free speech is a buzzword on college campuses, which tend to be regarded as “marketplaces of ideas’’ where stu-dents are encouraged to express opin-ions freely, said Brian Levin, director of Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at California State Univer-sity, San Bernardino.

But sometimes opinions can cross into offensiveness.

In 2007, a UCLA fraternity mem-

ber sent out invitations to a Mexican-themed “Fiesta Friday’’ party. But administrators received complaints that the event appeared to stereotype Mexican-Americans and the party was quickly canceled, said Eamon Reilly, a member of the fraternity’s board of di-rectors at the time.

“It’s a very fine line between what is insensitive and what is sensitive,’’ Reilly said. “A lot of people have a hard time drawing that line.’’

At UC Irvine, pro-Palestinian stu-dents saw the jeering of the Israeli Am-bassador Michael Oren as a political statement, but administrators saw it as intolerance, albeit of a political view-point. Eleven students were arrested.

“This is a place where we would like to expose students to a wide a spectrum of the world as we can con-struct,’’ Provost Pitts said. “We have a very broad curve of human belief here. It’s a huge place. So it’s hurtful that this comes up.’’

Experts point out that some racist incidents are likely sophomoric pranks as students cross the bridge from ado-lescence to adulthood.

Although students are expected to behave as adults, some still possess a teenager’s impulsiveness and desire to impress peers which can lead to boor-ish behavior. Then there are the copy-cats who enjoy the ensuing uproar and media attention. “It’s the jackass phenomenon,’’ Cal State’s Levin said. “Most are not hard-core bigots, but some are.’’

Levin and others note that bias inci-dents occur on campuses all over the country, and college hate crimes are likely vastly underreported.

A month of alleged bigotry at University of California

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The PaisanoMarch 9, 2010 The Paisano

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News 2

Derek TrimmCurrent Position: SGA Vice Presi-dent

Student Committees: Politcal Action,Co-founder Go Green, University Advancement

Running Mates: VP Nicole Munoz, Treasurer Roger Frigstad, Secre-tary Xavier Johnson

Platform

Limit overall cost of attendance

Build more UTSA traditions and pride

Josh BartCurrent position: SGA Secretary

Student Committees: Chariman of Transportation, Beverage & Pour-ing Rights, Student Bill of Rights, University Police Interaction, Student Service Fee, Parking & Traffic, Food Service Advisory

Running Mates: VP Sergio Maltos, Treasurer Chuck Horvilleur, Sere-tary Roxanne Weiss

Platform

Fix the leaks in the Sombrilla

More student representation on University Committees

Fight for SGA PresidentStudent Government elections, March 9-10 on ASAP

SGA elections are March 9-10. The two candidates agree on the following issues: Turning UTSA into a wet campus and creating a student bill of rights.

Associated Press

Trees live longer than most living beings, they benefit the environment, they are habitat for other forms of life and, in their entire splendor, they are a treat to view.

Those are some of the traits that David Wesse, Louisiana State Univer-sity at Alexandria vice chancellor for finance and administration, thinks of when he walks by the trees near his of-fice and beyond on the campus land-scape.

Exactly 234 trees have been planted on campus since January 2004 when LSUA began observing Arbor Day, Wesse said as he looked at his favorite type of tree _ a sprawling live oak.

Live oaks “keep its color all year, and it doesn’t lose its leaves at one time,’’ said Wesse, who has spearheaded the effort to expand the campus tree pro-gram.

LSUA, which was built on the for-mer Oakland Plantation, was recently recognized for its tree program and was designated as a Tree Campus USA university by the Arbor Day Founda-tion.

Wesse and Margaret Waring, a landscape architect who also likes live oaks, belong to an army of individu-

als responsible for the upkeep of the hundreds of trees on campus that over the years have expanded to include 27 varieties.

“Even though we are all in love with the live oak, we are trying to get a lot of other varieties,’’ Wesse said.

Some of the tree types planted in re-cent years include red maples, red bud, cypress, southern magnolias, catalpas, river birch, ginkgo biloba, shumandi oak, cedars, Bradford pear, sweet bay magnolia, yaupon, water oak, shanghai maples, persimmon, drake elms, rain trees, swamp chestnut, sycamores, white oaks and black gum.

Recently planted trees exclude trees planted before LSUA’s existence, some of which are estimated to be 250 years old and which have become silent wit-nesses to the rich history of the cam-pus.

“That’s the first one we named,’’ said Robert Karam, facilities services direc-tor, pointing to a live oak with a broad canopy. This tree also became the model for the LSUA logo.

The designation recognizes colleges that support urban forest management and engage students and other mem-bers of the community in environmen-tal stewardship.

LSUA is only the fourth university

in Louisiana to earn the Tree Campus USA designation.

Waring said trees not only are ben-eficial for air quality and as a cooling factor in the summer months, but they add to the ambiance of the campus and become learning opportunities for students.

Students recently have begun a tree inventory to determine the exact num-ber of trees on campus and will place plaques at the base of some trees, de-scribing the type of tree and its history, officials said.

Waring also said that lights are being placed to accentuate some of the trees that have been named after LSUA con-tributors. All of the named LSUA oaks have been registered with the Louisi-ana Live Oak Society.

In addition, officials said a roughly four-mile walking trail that will weave its way trough some the trees looping the campus is under construction. The project completion is pending grant funding.

Such a trail will encourage people to walk, Waring said.

“In a safe, attractive setting, a walker is more inclined to continue walking regularly and for longer distances,’’ Waring said.

Louisiana State University designated as a tree campus

Associated Press

Michelle Cuestas of Green Bay used two vacation days and camped out for 43 hours to make sure her grand-son would be first in line for the 2010 opening of a Stevens Point ice-cream landmark.

Belts' Soft Serve opened for the year Friday at 11 a.m. Thanks to grandma, 6-year-old Brayden Banks placed the first order.

The Stevens Point Journal says Cuestas arrived Wednesday at 4 p.m. She planned to spend the night in her car but after locking her keys in the

car, she instead slept in the Belts bath-room.

Brayden arrived Thursday morning. The two passed the last 24 hours play-ing games, reading and drawing.

Cuestas says the wait was worth it. She says making memories with her grandson is priceless.

Grandma camps out for 43 hoursPh

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