Professor starts newspaper for sports buffs
Paper plans to fill
niche by covering
ignored activities
By Kristine Long
Staff Reporter
Most people don’t know that Lin
coln has a snowmobiling club.
Even fewer people know that Lin
coln has the only acrobatics club in Ne
braska and more than 20,000 softball play
ers.
Gary Vac in, professor of agricultural lead
ership, education and communications at
UNL, didn’t know these facts, either, until a
few months ago.
But Vacin did know other unpublicizcd
sports existed in Lincoln, so he created his
own newspaper — Lincoln’s Unnamed
Sports Newspaper.
“I’ve always been a heck of a sports fan,”
Vacin said, “and it dawned on me that there
might be a niche for this kind of publication
in Lincoln.”
Vacin published the first issue of the
paper on Jan. 6. Since then, he has learned
about more of Lincoln’s “minor sports” and
sports activities.
The paper, which is published on the first
Wednesday of every month, provides cover
age of sports such as tennis, hunting, soft
ball, bowling, hockey, children’s leagues
% and about 60 other sports not covered in
local newspapers.
Vacin said the vast numberof Lincolnitcs
involved in sports kept the Lincoln Star and
the Lincoln Journal from covering them all.
He said when he first thought of the idea
for the paper, he immediately conducted a
feasibility study to sec if it could work.
He said he talked to sports stores in
Lincoln and to journalism professors at the
University of Ncbraska-Lincoln.
He received both positive and negative
feedback during his study.
“I heard that Lincoln was a graveyard for
niche publishing,” Vacin said.
Micneiie Kauiman/UN
John Bacon, left, a senior advertising major, Gary Vacin, a UNL professor, and Kent Kopetzky, a senior
broadcasting major, put out Lincoln’s Unnamed Sports Newspaper in Vacin's basement.
But he decided to take the risk and to try
to disprove the theory.
He hired two students from the UNL
College of Journalism, set up a workspace in
his basement and began publ ishing his paper
Dec. 18.
Five thousand copies of the first issue
were distributed free of charge. Vacin said
he left copies at grocery stores, sports stores
and other places where sports fans gather,
such as baskctbal I games and Y MCA events.
Vacin said the newspaper carried the
most comprehensive list of sports and sports
related aclivines ever prepared in Lincoln.
And the feedback was tremendous.
In the second issue, Feb. 3, the number of
advertisers tripled, Vacin said.
Kent Kopcizky, a senior broadcasting
major at UNL, is the reporter for Vacin’s
paper. He said he thought the paper would be
a success.
“Judging from the early response,”
Kopcizky said, “it seems like we have found
an audience.”
John Bacon, a senior advertising major
who designs ads and layouts for the paper,
said he was excited about the idea of a sports
newspaper.
Bacon said the paper opened a whole new
area because it “caters to sports that aren’t
usually covered, like karate and kid’s sports.”
Vacin said the 12-page newspaper prob
ably would'increase to 16 pages by March
and it might even cam a name.
The paper is conducting a “Name the
Newspaper” contest through February, Vacin
said.
Federal law has NU updating old family leave policy
By Virginia Newton
Staff Reporter
The University of Nebraska will
revise its family leave policy to
comply with federal law, a uni
versity official said.
President Bill Clinton signed a bill
last week that made family leave a
national law. However, a similar
policy has been in effect at NU since
November, said John P. Russell, NU
personnel director and assistant vice
president for business and finance.
The NU policy allows 12 weeks of
unpaid family leave during a 24
monlh period. Family leave is used in
the event of childbirth, adoption, ill
ness or death of a family member.
“The federal law just passed only
allows for 12 weeks of unpaid leave in
a 12-month period,” Russell said.
“This is the main difference between
our law and the federal law.”
He said he didn’t think the NU
policy would need much revision.
“1 understand (the NU policy) is
very similar to the federal law be
cause we modeled our policy after
federal proposals,” he said.
The federal family-leave law will
go into effect in six months. NU will
not begin revision of its policy until
after the six-month period, Russell
said.
“We don ’ t want to rush intochang
ing anything to find out the changes
were unnecessary,” he said. “We’ll
study the law and make the appropri
ate changes.”
Technically, the NU Board of Re
gents would not have to amend the
policy, Russell said. In six months,
federal law automatically will modify
- it
We're going to look at what the federal law states and
amend where we conflict.
-Russel I
NU personnel director
- A* —
the NU policy.
However, there are a number of
stipulations not covered by the fed
eral law.
“We’re going to look at what the
federal law states and amend where
w w
wc conflict,” Russell said.
Russell said few employees had
taken advantage of the university
policy, probably because the policy
hadn’t been in effect for long and
because the leave was unpaid.
UNL Anti-Semitism less than U.S. norm, professor says
114 Incidents at 60 colleges
and universities, a 12%
Increase since 1991 and has
doubled over the last 5 years.
Off-campus anti-semitism
decreased 8% in 1992.
Source: Anti-Defamation League
Scott Maurer/DN
By Karen Okamoto
Staff Reporter
A Jewish organization an
nounced last week that anti
Semitism on the nation's col
lege campuses was on the rise, but
university officials said no rash of
such reports had hit UNL.
Still, one University of Ncbraska
Lincoln instructor said anti-Semitism
was an “institutionalized’’ campus
problem.
Last year, 114 incidents were re
corded at 60 colleges and universi
ties, the Anti-Defamation League re
ported. The numbers represented a
doubling of incidents in the last five
years, and a 12 percent increase from
1991.
At the same lime, the total number
of anti-Semitic incidents nationwide
decreased by 8 percent, the organiza
tion said.
Bruce Erlich, associate professor
of English and modem languages and
literatures, said he had received anti
Semitic treatment from administra
tors and faculty members on campus.
“I’ve been race-bailed by UNL
administrators in my presence to my
face,” he said. “They did not actually
say ‘dirty Jew,’ but they said the
equivalent to it in six different ways."
In one case, Erlich said, ‘‘He (a
UNL administrator) told me, ‘Jews
control the profession of leaching
English.’"
Erlich said the administrator also
told him that “real work in the profes
sion of English is done by poor white
boys from the wrong sidcof the tracks"
while “Jews sit on top of the profes
sion writing books,” he said.
Erlich said racism against Jews
was just as real as racism against
African Americans, Native Ameri
cans and Hispanics. However, he said,
people do not recognize their racism
against Jews as often as they do against
other groups.
Erlich said he would like to sec that
changed.
But Eric Jolly, director of affirma
tive action and diversity programs,
said anti-Semitism had not proven to
be a “frequent” problem at UNL.
His office has received one infor
mal complaint about anti-Semitism
since he took over in September, and
that incident was resolved, he said.
Peg Blake, assistant vice chancel
lor for student affairs, said the issue of
anti-Semitism had not been brought
to her office’s attention.
“I don’t think it’s a big problem on
this campus,” she said.
Sgt. Mylo Bushing of the Univer
sity Police said he could recall less
than six hate-biased crimes reported
to his department since August 1991,
when the police began keeping track
of such information.
However, the exact figures could
not be retrieved from the computer
system, and Bushing said he was not
sure if any of those incidents were
anti-Semitic.
Bushing said that, based on his
recollection, he did not think anti
Semitism was a problem. However,
some cases likely go unreported to
police, he said.
In recent limes, one anti-Semitic
incident has been reported at
Creighton University, said Bob
WoIIson, regional director of ADL in
Omaha.
Nebraska had a stale total of 11
cases last year and nine in 1991, he
said.
However, Wolfson said the num
bers could be dccciv ing because ADL
tallied only incidents that had been
reported directly to it or in the press.
